The Hall Carbine Affair A Study In Contemporary Folklore

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THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

SIMON STEVENS

after a photograph taken in Mexico in May 1872, and discovered through
the courtesy of Miss Edith Harriet Wallace, of Barnet, Vermont.

THE HALL CARBINE AFMIR

dy In Contemporary Cfolkhn

R. GORDON WASSON

lie
II
tfew Vork i, N. Y*

114$

COPYRIGHT 1941, 1948

BY E. GORDON WASSON

First edition in 1941 100 copies

Revised edition in 194.8 750 copies

PREFACE

Everyone who is acquainted with biographical material
published about the late J. Pierpont Morgan, founder of
the banking house, will recall the episode in the Civil War
in which he is alleged to have sold to the Government some
condemned arms at a profit that would have been exorbi-
tant for first class weapons.

Certain writers have charged, and say they have proved,
that Morgan got his start, or was helped to get his start,
by swindling our Government in this transaction. They
allege that he bought from the Ordnance Bureau thousands
of obsolete carbines, and then re-sold these identical arms
to troops in the field for many times more than he had paid
for them. They go on to assert that these defective arms
shot off the thumbs of the Union soldiers who used them.
Finally, they say that in the face of a public outcry the
banker pushed a claim against the Government for pay-
ment.

In this book we shall prove that the alleged transaction,
insofar as the case against Morgan is concerned, is legend,
not history. We shall show that the case against Morgan
was built up by these modern writers through the suppres-
sion of true evidence, the suggestion of false evidence,
garbled evidence, and plain misquotation from documents.

Part I is a detailed narrative of what actually took
place. Part II, after recapitulating the facts, relates the
growth of the Hall carbine legend. For the reader who
finds the minutiae of Part I burdensome, Part II will tell
the whole story.

Legends are often history processed to point some
noraL They are misleading as history, but they help us to
understand the people who invent and believe in them.
Usually the world recognizes as legends only the outgrown
cables of earlier generations. But this is merely because,

vi.......

* **

beiieving as we do our own legends, we do not recognize
them for what they are.

It is proposed in this little essay to dissect sinew by
sinew, and nerve by nerve, a living legend, a legend born
in our own generation and until 1939 palpitant with the
vitality of unchallenged acceptance. This specimen of mis-
belief will be tested as real history is tested. In its own
right it is only a modest little yarn, but we shall scrutinize
it as rigorously as if it made all the difference. Its start
is an obscure happening of some three-quarters of a century
ago, of no great importance then and of none at all for a
long time after, until it was taken hold of, clothed upon,
and finished off with horns, hoofs, and tail as a bogey-man,
by a school of writers who call themselves historians and
serious thinkers.

Starting with nothing, or as good as nothing, these
molders of opinion by a very act of creation have built up
from it a history, a moral, a warning, an economics, and
in reverse a vision of a new and better world. A mouse
having labored, a mountain was born. Legends that take
hold on the popular imagination are the ones that tell the
people what they wish to believe, and this legend took hold.
Thus fact became fiction, and fiction History : a little inci-
dent, released by uncorking the bottle, magically swelled
before our very eyes into a Horrible Example, solemnly
authenticated as Truth by our college of augurs.

Only a trifle, you may say, to give so much time to.
But the history of this legend will point a moral : a moral
that the authors of the legend surely never dreamed of !

R. G. W.

New York
July 29, 1941.

Vll

PREFACE TO THE REVISED EDITION

Though no effort was made to draw public attention to
this book, three learned quarterlies reviewed the first edi-
tion and there developed a slow, steady demand for it that
could not be met. It has therefore seemed worth while to
bring out a new edition, and to send it for critical attention
to such scholarly journals as might interest themselves in
it. We have taken advantage of this new edition to revise
the book: there have been no deletions and no changes of
substance, but additional information, all confirmatory in
character and some of it piquant, has come to light, and is
now incorporated in our text.

E. G. W.

New York
March 30, 1948.

CONTENTS

Preface v

Preface to the Revised Edition vii

Part I

An Episode in History
Prologue ---------.. 3

Wherein Arthur M. Eastman Buys Some Arms - 6
At Last Eastman Finds a Buyer in the Person of One
Simon Stevens n

How Stevens Encounters Difficulties, and Falls into

the Clutches of Ketchum ---._, I9
The Timely Intervention of John T. Howard - - 25
Wherein Stevens Turns a Letter to Account in a

Surprising Way 3 o

Wherein a Shuffling of Documents and a Public

Investigation Have Their Genesis - 33

Wherein a Congressional Committee Asks Questions

and Ventures Comments 37

Wherein a War Department Commission Assembles

Documents and Reaches Conclusions - 45

The Court Speaks 5I

The Hall Carbine : Was It a Condemned and Worth-
less Arm? --- 55

Simon Stevens: A Possible Solution to an Enigma 65
Epilogue __. 72

Part II

History into Legend

What Happened 77

A Legend Is Born --- 82

Lewis Corey's Version - - 93

The Story Told at Fourth Hand 96

The Legend Becomes Accepted Fact 103

Legend v. History n8

Notes i2i

Bibliography *49

Appendix I Reprint from Gustavus Myers - - 155

II Eeprint from Lewis Corey - - - 163

III Eeprint from John K Winkler - - 172

IV Eeprint from Matthew Josephson - 175

V Eeprint from H. C. Engelbrecht and

F. C. Hanighen 180

VI Eeprint from George Seldes - - 184

Index 187

Illustrations

FACING PAGE

Simon Stevens, engraving - - - - Frontispiece

Voucher No. i 33

Voucher No. 2--- 34

Statement of Ketchum's Account with Stevens - 42

First Page of Ordnance Commission's Report 46

Hall Carbine, engraving - 56

Hall Carbine: Breech-block Eaised for Loading

engraving 57

Pages from Revised Army Eegulations of 1861 - 62

Pages from Ordnance Bureau Report Showing Pur-
chases of Hall Guns in August 1861 - - - - 64

Comparison of Lewis Corey's Text with Original

Documents -- 94

Part I
AN EPISODE IN HISTORY

Prologue

The sale of the Hall carbines took place in August 1861,
when the Civil War was just getting under way. For
months the prospects for the Union had looked critical.

Abraham Lincoln's election in the fall of 1860 had pre-
cipitated the crisis. Early in 1861 the federal government's
credit had sunk so low that the Treasury was forced to pay
12 per cent, for money borrowed to meet its debt service.
In the money market a number of the more substantial
Northern states enjoyed higher standing than the United
States, and there was support in Congress for a proposal
that these states buttress the faltering federal credit by
adding their endorsement to a new issue of federal bonds.
In February the seceding states organized their govern-
ment at Montgomery, Alabama. The peril of the hour was
agitating the nation. Lincoln, in fear for his life, stole
incognito into Washington to his own inauguration, misled
by unfounded reports of a conspiracy. In New York City
the Democratic Mayor, Fernando Wood, was asking the
Common Council to consider setting up the municipality as
a free city, severed from all allegiance to state or nation.

The bombardment of Fort Sumter on April 12 and its
surrender fired the North with martial fever, and war in a
grimmer guise 1 began on April 19 when a Baltimore mob
obstructed the passage of Massachusetts troops through
their city on the way to the capital. These Baltimore dis-
orders resulting in bloodshed and death closed the road to
Washington for about three weeks, compelling reinforce-
ments to take a circuitous water route and cutting off regu-
lar communications postal and telegraphic between the
seat of government and the North. The panic of those
weeks gave way to a measure of reassurance when the
route through Baltimore was reopened in May, but alarm
again swept the North after the humiliating rout of the
federal forces at Bull Run on July 21. For days it was

For all notes see pp. 121-148.

4 THE HALL CAKBINE AFFAIR

feared that Washington would he lost, and arms and men
were rushed to the Potomac.

Naturally enough, there was a lag in translating the
bellicosity of the North into an effective war machine.
Immediately after the fall of Fort Sumter President Lincoln
issued the first of a series of calls to arms. Independently
of the federal authorities, military units began to organize
themselves locally, under state and municipal auspices, and
under groups known as Union Defense Committees that
seemed to spring spontaneously into existence, wielding for
a time extraordinary influence, raising money, buying sup-
plies, and equipping and dispatching troops. Overnight the
need for equipment, especially arms, became acute.

It was months before the authorities appreciated the
need for a central purchasing agency for ordnance stores.
In peace times the only demand for military supplies had
come from the standing army of some 16,000 men; and
their modest requirements were met by drawing on the
stocks in the Government arsenals. Generally, military
arms had been made in these arsenals, but sometimes con-
tracts had been placed with private manufacturers. At the
outset no one foresaw the duration and scope of the war,
and it was only in mid-July of 1861 that the Chief of Ord-
nance delegated an officer Major P. V. Hagner to take
charge of arms purchases from private contractors in New
York.

Major Hagner's subsequent testimony 2 before a select
House Committee appointed to investigate Government con-
tracts supplies a vivid description of the condition in the
arms market in the summer of 1861. From this testimony
Major Hagner himself emerges sharply drawn as a figure
of the times : a blunt-spoken military man, conscientious,
competent in his specialty of arms, impatient with the in-
efficiency and chicanery around him, close in his business
dealings to the point where, as he himself testified, other
buyers usually carried off the guns he was bidding for by
topping his price.

When Major Hagner reached New York on Saturday,
July 13, to assume his duties as purchasing and inspecting

PROLOGUE 5

officer, he found the market in confusion. On the one hand,
the buying agents of states, cities, Defense Committees,
generals, and colonels were bidding frantically against one
another and against the federal government for the same
small supply of arms. On the other hand, the market was
plagued with middlemen, many of whom knew nothing of
arms, who besieged the buying agents with proposals.
Things reached a pass where speculation in arms was
taking the place of speculation in the stock market, and the
arms peddler carrying a sample of his wares became a
familiar sight in the streets of New York. Middlemen own-
ing no arms, except perhaps the sample in their hands,
would struggle to land contracts at high prices, hoping to
connect with manufacturers at a profit afterwards. Buyers,
mindful only of the urgent needs of the troops they repre-
sented, would bite at any bait. The confusion in the arms
market spread quickly to Europe: it was said that on one
ship five of these agents took passage, and later allowed
themselves to be played off against one another by sharp
European sellers. Buyers scoured Europe for arms, and
while the highly esteemed Enfield rifle figured conspicu-
ously in the purchases, they also shipped over obsolescent
Continental arms bought at prices beyond their worth.
Major Hagner, representing the Ordnance Bureau in New
York, was struggling to hold the market down and to per-
suade competing buyers to work through him.

This was the situation when our 5,000 Hall carbines
changed hands.

Wherein Arthur M, Eastman Buys Some Arms

Lieutenant Colonel James W. Ripley had reached the
Red Sea on his way to Japan, whither he was bound on a
military mission, when reports reached him that trouble
was brewing between North and South. 8 Disregarding the
orders under which he was traveling, he turned about and
made the journey home in spectacular time. On April 23,
1861, the Adjutant General placed him in charge of the
Ordnance Bureau, and shortly afterwards he was made a
Brigadier General. Ripley was a West Point man and an
old timer in the army, having served in the War of 1812
and having spent the forty-nine intervening years in the
service.

Some weeks after Ripley assumed charge of the Ord-
nance Bureau, one Arthur M. Eastman turned up with a,
proposal Eastman was aware that the Government had in
its possession a number of Hall's carbines, a model that was
tending to become outmoded, but that otherwise he under-
stood was a "very good arm". He asked to be allowed to
alter the ones owned by the Government, so as to bring
them up-to-date for use in the emergency.* Had Ripley
accepted Eastman's offer to alter the arms, there would
have been no Hall carbine affair. But he rejected it.

Little is known about Eastman, except that he hailed
from Manchester, New Hampshire ; that he had no regular
business but had "been more or less concerned with firearms
for twelve or fifteen years, in both this country and in
Europe"; and that he considered himself a judge of fire-
arms. 5 Of vital interest for our purpose is the convincing
evidence that between Ripley and Eastman there was no
collusion. Nothing in the record suggests that the two men
had ever met before; and Eastman, after he had reached
his agreement with Ripley to buy the arms, was so uncer-
tain of the man he was dealing with that he sent Ripley a
letter of recommendation from the Senator of his home
state, Daniel Clark. 6 All of Eastman's letters to Ripley are
marked by a tone of uncertainty that is incompatible with

EASTMAN BUYS SOME ARMS 7

any theory of a conspiracy between the two men. Indeed,
Eastman's honesty seems not to have been questioned by
contemporaries. The Committee of the House that investi-
gated the transaction, certainly predisposed to be hostile,
went out of its way to point out that they had found no
evidence of bad faith on his part, although lamenting his
"unfortunate eagerness to speculate on the misfortunes of
the country.'" His story, as unfolded in his testimony be-
fore the Committee and later before the special Ordnance
Commission appointed by the War Department, was
straightforward, detailed, consistent. He testified under
oath that no one was interested with him in his purchase
or his sale of the Hall carbines. 8 There is much evidence to
support his testimony: there is not a shred of evidence,
direct or circumstantial, to the contrary.

The correspondence 9 between Ripley and Eastman took
place in late May and in June 1861. On May 28 Eastman,
being then in Washington, addressed a letter to Ripley say-
ing that since the latter declined to have the Hall's carbines
altered, he offered to buy them at three dollars each for
those in good order and proportionately for the others, pay-
ment to be cash on delivery, the guns to be taken within
ninety days. The number of the carbines reported in the
Government's possession was 5,184, and "damaged, 1,240
additional". On the next day Ripley submitted Eastman's
offer to Simon Cameron, Secretary of War, with recom-
mendation for approval, the price however to be $3.50 for
each arm "of every quality or condition." Cameron gave
his approval on June i.

Apparently Ripley and Eastman had a talk together, for
on June 2 Eastman wrote another letter asking Ripley to
put their "verbal arrangement" into writing, and to give
instructions to Captain R. H. K Whiteley at Governor's
Island to hand over the carbines a thousand at a time
against payment plus a $500 good faith deposit. There is
no answer to this letter in the record.

A third letter went forward from Eastman on June 5,
this time from the St. Nicholas Hotel In New York. He
again accepts Ripley's terms, and adds that he will be ready

8 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

to begin taking the arms "within a few days". (Here is the
first intimation of the difficulties that were besetting East-
man. He was beginning to play for time, because he did
not have money to swing the purchase.) He presumes
that Eipley will cheerfully consent, as a business accommo-
dation, to let the arms go in lots at intervals. (Naturally,
this would simplify the financial problem.) To take them
all at once, he explains, would be unwieldly, and the loft at
the arsenal on Governor's Island is almost empty. But he
hastens to explain that he is not making the delivery in
partial lots a condition of his acceptance. The letter con-
cludes with this gratuitous observation : "I do not find the
arms quite so valuable as I hoped/'

This time, on June 6, Ripley answers. He rejects East-
man's plea:

Sir: Your letter of the sth instant is received. The instructions
of the Secretary of War authorize the sale of the carbines "if all,
of every quality or condition, are taken at the average of $3.50."
You will thus see that you must buy and pay for all before you can
take away any. When you have paid for all, there will be no objec-
tion to leaving at the arsenal, subject to delivery there, on your order,
such as you do not desire to take away immediately; provided that
they can be stored there without inconvenience, of which the com-
manding officer must judge and decide.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,

JAMES W. RIPLEY,
Lieutenant Colonel of Ordnance.

Ripley's letter puts Eastman up against it. On June 1 1
we find him writing a fourth communication, this time from
Manchester, his home town, "I will be in Washington
within a few days", he says, "and settle the account for the
purchase of the 'Hall's carbines' of the government." And
he adds : "As evidence of my ability to do so, I refer you
to letter of Hon. Daniel Clark, United States senator from
this State, to the Secretary of War". He was plainly
uneasy about his finances, and straining to keep up ap-
pearances.

A week elapses, and on the i8th a fifth letter goes for-
ward, again from Manchester : "I am ready to receive and
pay for the 'HalFs carbines'." He asks Ripley to give him

EASTMAN BUYS SOME AKMS 9

an order on the officers in command "at the places of
deposit", and he will take the arms at once, paying for them
according to the agreement. He will go to Washington, if
necessary, to settle the account. (Again he is playing for
time.)

On June 20 Ripley replies that he is giving instructions
on that day to the commanding officer at Governor's Island
and at the Frankford Arsenal (near Philadelphia) "to sett
to you all the 'Hall's carbines' of every description (service-
able and unserviceable) on hand, at the rate of $3.50
apiece."

Note the word "serviceable". This was later thrown
into Ripley's face, as it conceded that a Hall carbine was a
serviceable weapon. 10 Indeed, it is hard to reconcile the
wording of this letter with an official memorandum signed
by Ripley less than a month before, on May 27, specifying
that "sales of ordnance stores are restricted to such as are
condemned on regular inspection as damaged or otherwise
unserviceable"* (Italics not in original)

The letter of June 20 closed the correspondence. The
next development, so far as the Government was concerned,
took place almost seven weeks later, on August 7, when
Captain Whiteley, at Governor's Island, handed over to
Eastman 4,996 HalPs carbines, in new condition, packed in
boxes and with appurtenances, in exchange for a draft for
$17,486.

In those intervening seven weeks a change for the worse
had taken place in the outlook for the Union. The battle
of Bull Run in the East and the spread of insurgency in
the West caused acute alarm, and "there was no period of
the war when the demand for arms was greater than in
the early days of August, 1861" Why did not Ripley
countermand his instructions to his arsenal commander?
No one knows. Nor does anyone know why Whiteley, a
man of responsible position, did not query his chief before
complying with instructions that the lapse of time and the
course of events had done much to render idiotic. Pos-
sibly Ripley felt he was bound by the conditions of East-
man's letter of May 28, in which the buyer was to have

10 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

ninety days to take the arms. Or again, the explanation
may lie in bureaucratic inadvertence.

As for Ripley, most commentators later criticised him
for the sale, but no one impugned his honesty. (He con-
tinued to hold his post for almost two years longer, until
September 15, 1863.) In fact, some of those who criticised
him most harshly went out of their way to safeguard his
good name. His enemies taunted him with being "behind
the age". They questioned whether "the old general has
yet waked up to the necessity of providing for this war".
They damned him by calling him "a good, kind old gentle-
man". The best that his friends could do was to praise his
character and his faithful observance of military precepts,
and to point out that the Secretary of War had approved
the sale. 13

Perhaps it is possible to make out a better defense for
Ripley today, after more than 85 years, than it was in the
heat and turmoil of those ensuing months. At the very
moment of the correspondence with Eastman, he was cal-
culating his ordnance requirements on an ultimate enroll-
ment of 250,000 soldiers. 1 * This figure soon came to look
absurdly small. But in the spring of 1861 level-headed per-
sons did not foresee the magnitude that the war would soon
assume, and it must have seemed a mighty program to
expand an army with a peace footing of 1 6,ooo 15 men to a
quarter of a million. According to Hagner, the Union pos-
sessed arms at this time for about 200,000 men. 16 Ripley
may well have thought that he could obtain some 50,000
more arms of the latest models without undue delay, so that
he would not have to fall back on what was less than the
best. In fact, his detailed plans for meeting the deficiency,
by placing private contracts at home and abroad and by
speeding up production at the Government plant at Spring-
field, are still in existence. 17 It did not occur to him, and
probably to no one else, that two months later, in August,
more than 500,000 men would be crying for weapons; and
that a deficiency, easily manageable, of 50,000 arms in
June, would quickly become a frantic scramble for more
than 300,000.^

At Last Eastman Finds a Buyer in the Person of One Simon
Stevens

Though Eastman had in hand a valuable contract with
the Government, he faced difficulties in turning it to advan-
tage. He had little or no money and no financial backer,
and he had to take all the carbines or none. He therefore
had to find a buyer before he himself could buy the arms,
and his customer would have to advance the funds for
Eastman to get possession of the arms he was selling.
Instead of the customary order of buying and selling, East-
man had to sell and get partly paid before he could buy
and deliver. At the same time, in trading with a prospective
buyer he could not afford to disclose that he had not yet
acquired the carbines; much less that they were still in
possession of the United States Government and that the
lapse of time and changed conditions might well cause the
Government to withdraw from its contract. If aware of
Eastman's difficulties, the buyer would drive a hard bargain.

It was not until the arms market was in a ferment after
Bull Run that Eastman found his man. He was sounding
out a number of persons, offering them his carbines by
sample and naming his price. One of them was a Major
E. S. Hubbard. Another was H. H. Babcock, whose figure
emerges dimly from the yellowing pages of the contempo-
rary records; he lived in Fort Plain, N. Y., "but spends
much of his time in Washington". There were others. 19

Eastman met Major Hubbard for the first time along in
July. Hubbard told him he would buy the carbines, or, if
not, he would introduce him to someone who would. 80
Accordingly, on Monday, July 29, they went down Broadway
together carrying a sample carbine with them to the federal
storehouse at 56 Broadway, and there Hubbard introduced
Eastman to Simon Stevens in the latter's office. 21 Eastman
and Stevens had not known each other before, and the
acquaintance of both with Hubbard was of the slimmest. 22
Hubbard and Eastman arrived just as Stevens was leaving
his office "to take the cars" for Washington, where he was
to remain a few days, and they had only about five minutes

12 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

together. Stevens saw that the carbine was a smoothbore,
new, with a cast-steel barrel, of superior workmanship. He
advised Eastman to have the sample arm rifled and "cham-
bered" to suit modern cartridges of Government standard.
When that was done, he might consider making a proposal.
He then hurried off to Washington. 28 ("Chambering"
meant enlarging the bore of the breech, where the charge
was pushed home, until it corresponded with the bore of
the barrel to the base of the rifling grooves. Eifling the
smoothbores made "chambering" necessary, for if the
breech was not enlarged, the lead bullet would slip through
the barrel without acquiring the rotation desired from the
rifling. But if the breech was enlarged, the lead bullet
under the impact of the explosion would expand to fill the
breech-chamber, and on entering the barrel would "take"
the grooves.)

Two or three days later Eastman turned up at Stevens's
hotel in Washington with his sample rifled and chambered,
all as Stevens had suggested, and there and then, on August
i, 1 86 1, Eastman and Stevens made this contract together: 2 *

WHEREAS, A. M. Eastman, of Manchester, N. H., lias purchased
of the United States Government, and is now the owner of five thou-
sand carbines, known as "Hall's Carbines"; and

WHEEEAS, Simon Stevens agrees to loan to said Eastman the sum
of twenty thousand dollars within five days herefrom, and to have
a lien upon said property, as collateral security for the payment of
said loan, and it is further agreed that said Simon Stevens, so fur-
nishing said sum of twenty thousand dollars, said Eastman agrees
to sell to said Stevens said carbines at the rate of twelve dollars and
fifty cents each, deliverable on demand, after the loan of the twenty
thousand dollars is made.

This agreement limited to twenty days from date.

Witness our hands, this the (ist) first day of August, 1861, at
Washington City, D. C.

ARTHUR M. EASTMAN
SIMON STEVENS

The terms of the agreement are revealing. Eastman
was dealing at arm's length with a stranger, and he was not
disclosing more than he had to. He was representing him-
self as "now the owner of five thousand carbines", which

EASTMAN FINDS A BUYER 13

he was not. He was setting up a deal that would first give
him a loan of $20,000 before completing the sale of the arms ;
this was to enable him to take possession of the arms from
the Government. The terms of the contract also suited
Stevens. He had no money, but he could hope to borrow
$20,000 against arms that were worth at least several times
that amount, and then, with the market for arms what it
was, he could re-sell the arms within twenty days, pay off
the loan, liquidate his account with Eastman, and have a
profit.

On Monday, August 5, Stevens was back in New York.
Unbeknownst to Eastman, 25 he sent the following prepaid
"telegraph" to General John C. Fremont, then in. command
of the Western Department r 2 *

56 Broadway,
New York, Aug. 5, 1861

J. C. Fremont,

Major-General Commanding,
Cairo, Illinois

I have five thousand Hall's rifled, cast-steel Carbines, breech-
loading, new, at twenty-two dollars, government standard, fifty-eight
[caliber]. Can I hear from you?

SIMON STEVENS

This dispatch was forwarded to Fremont in St. Louis.

Fremont knew well the article that Stevens was offering
him, for he had himself carried and used a Hall's carbine
on one of his overland journeys. 27

On the next day, he answered Stevens:

Dated Headquarters, 1861,
Western Department,
Received Aug. 6th.

St. Louis, Aug. 6th

Simon Stevens:

I will take the whole five thousand carbines. See agents Adams'
Express, and send by express not fast freight. I will pay all extra
charges. Send also ammunition. Devote yourself solely to that busi-
ness today.

J. C. FREMONT
Major-General

14 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

Fremont's precipitancy found Stevens unprepared, for of
course the rifling of the arms had not even started. He
replied immediately, this time collect:

New York, Aug. 6, 1861
J. C. Fremont,
Major- General Commanding,
Department of the West,
St. Louis, Mo.

Dispatch received. Carbines not yet all rifled. Can commence
shipping Friday, and have them all off in ten days; will order one
hundred thousand cartridges.

(Signed) SIMON STEVENS

Late that night (11:4.5 p. m.) Fremont answered:

Dated St. Louis 6th, 1861
Eeceived Aug. yth.
To Simon Stevens:

Ship accordingly, but endeavor to make more speed with first
shipment.

J, C. FREMONT
Major-General

The times were ripe for selling arms, and of all men,
Fremont was at that moment the man to buy. General
John C. Fremont was a glamorous national figure, his ex-
ploits in the Far West having given him a romantic reputa-
tion and a political following. In 1856 he had headed the
Eepublican Party in its first national campaign, and he was
still a factor to be reckoned with. He had spent the first
half of 1 86 1 on a trip to Europe, where he had wrestled
with the financial difficulties of his Californian gold min-
ing property, the Mariposa stake. Hastening home on
news of the war, he had landed at Boston on June 27, and
he reached Washington on the next day. When on July 3
the Department of the West was created, the Government
assigned Fremont to it with the rank of Major General.
It was to be his duty to create and put into the field an
army. Realizing that arms would be his first need, he
spent much of July in New York, stopping at the Astor
House, and under instructions from Washington Major

EASTMAN FINDS A BUYER 15

Hagner undertook to assemble for him 27,000 stands of
arms. 28

Immediately after Bull Run Fremont went to St. Louis
and assumed command of his Department. He found con-
ditions critical. The Governor, Jackson, was a rebel, and
the loyalty of St. Louis was dubious. Insurgency was
rampant everywhere. The loyal forces, mostly raw re-
cruits, were badly fed, badly clothed, unpaid, mostly un-
armed, and discouraged. Loyal commanders, hard beset,
were calling from all sides for supplies. The terms of
volunteers who had enlisted for brief periods were expir-
ing and they were disbanding. On July 29, Fremont wired
to Hagner, "We must have arms any arms, no matter
what". 29 To fill his cup of woe, Hagner informed him, fol-
lowing Bull Run, that Washington had given orders to
divert all arms to the Potomac, so that Fremont could not
expect even those arms which had been promised. From
then on Fremont bought arms wherever he could get them,
and Stevens's telegram on August 5 came to him from
heaven.

With the Fremont telegrams in hand, Stevens on the
next day, Wednesday, August 7, was ready to exercise the
option that Eastman had given him. It was then, after
Fremont had accepted Stevens's offer, that Eastman broke
to him the fact that the carbines were lodged in the arsenal
on Governor's Island, and that Eastman, to make good his
title, had still to pay the United States Government for
them at $3.50 each. There is testimony indicating that, in
his initial surprise, Stevens's first question was whether
Eastman's purchase had had the approval of the Secretary
of War. Eastman, truly enough, answered in the affirma-
tive. The record does not disclose whether Stevens now
told Eastman about the sale to Fremont, but the testimony
seems to indicate that Eastman learned the destination of
the arms later. 30

Stevens was committed to lend Eastman $20,000, and
as he had no funds, he arranged with J. Pierpont Morgan
to lend him that amount. He enjoyed no independent
credit standing, and therefore under the terms of the loan

1 6 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

the carbines were to be held by Morgan as collateral. It
was further stipulated that when Stevens should find a
buyer for them, the buyer would be instructed to remit
payment to Morgan, to be applied against the loan. (It is
routine banking practice everywhere, always, for the pro-
ceeds of the sale of collateral to be paid to the lending bank,
so that the loan secured by the collateral is liquidated
therefrom.)

So Eastman and Stevens, accompanied by Morgan, went
to Governor's Island, 81 and there Morgan made his advance
of $20,000. He paid Captain Whiteley $17,486 with a draft
drawn on the Assistant Treasurer of the United States in
New York, and Whiteley delivered 4,996 Hall carbines with
their usual appendages and packing boxes to Eastman in
exchange for a receipt. At Eastman's request, Whiteley
consented to store the arms in the arsenal temporarily in
Morgan's name, and Morgan gave Eastman a receipt for
them. In addition to the $17,486 draft, Morgan handed
over $2,514 to Stevens who passed this money on to East-
man, completing by this payment the $20,000 loan called
for under the Eastman-Stevens contract of August i.

In the summer of 1861, J. Pierpont Morgan, then 24
years old, was carrying on a modest financial business in
Exchange Place. He had lately started in for himself, and
he had had no previous dealings with Stevens. There is
nothing in the official records to show why Stevens ap-
proached Morgan, rather than some well-known banker,
for financial accommodation; nor to show what induced
Morgan to make a loan to a man whom he knew at most
but slightly. The answer seems to lie largely in the
identity of Simon Stevens, and of this more will be said
later.

The record clearly establishes that Morgan knew he was
lending money for the purchase of arms from the Govern-
ment. Eastman was in a position to satisfy all interested
parties that the purchase had been properly authorized by
the Chief of Ordnance and the Secretary of War. How-
ever, in all the mass of documentation minutely defining
the Hall carbine affair, there is nowhere any evidence to

EASTMAN FINDS A BUYER 17

show that Stevens had informed Morgan about his con-
tract with Fremont when Morgan made his loan. As we
shall see, there is circumstantial evidence pointing toward
the conclusion that Stevens withheld this information from
his banker.

Late on the evening of August 7, Stevens sent Fremont
a third dispatch, again collect :

56 Broadway, Aug. 7, 1861
11:15 P- M.
John C. Fremont,
Major-General Commanding,
Department of the West,
St. Louis, Mo.

Dispatch received; commenced rifling carbines; can have them all
done in ten days; or could ship them all tomorrow at one dollar less
without rifling; [have telegraphed to Halifax, to meet Arabia, for
Henry to purchase and ship immediately five thousand sabres, belts,
etc. Will write him by Saturday's steamer] Answer.

(Signed) SIMON STEVENS

(The words in brackets relate to other matters.) Fr&tnont
answered on the next day, Thursday :

Dated Head Quarters, [Aug.] 8, 1861

St. Louis,
Received Aug. 8.
To Simon Stevens:

Dispatch received. You have done right. Go on with the rifling;
use dispatch.

J. C. FREMONT

By this message Fremont consented to a delay in delivery
that had not been contemplated when he accepted the arms
two days before.

According to Stevens, there was a further exchange of
dispatches, Stevens asking "when, where, and how" pay-
ments were to be made, and Fremont answering that "pay-
ments will be made on delivery". 32 If our supposition proves
correct that Morgan learned of Fremont's purchase only
after he had made his loan and when he could not with-
draw, these later telegrams may well have been prompted
by Morgan when he learned the truth and when, as banker,
he would immediately ask for this information.

1 8 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

Meanwhile Major Hubbard, in Washington, seems to
have dug up a new prospective buyer, and he wired a bid
of $25 to Stevens for 1,200 of the carbines; and Babcock
appears also to have made a bid for the whole lot at $25. *
But their bids, for whatever they were worth, were too
late. Eastman had succeeded in selling 5,000 guns for
$62,500 that he had bought for $17,500. The rifling and
chambering of the arms were to be at his expense, but by
agreement with Stevens this was commuted into a reduc-
tion in the price of sale from $12.50 to $11.50, making a
total sum due to Eastman of $57,500. Of this he had re-
ceived $20,000, and for the balance he took a twenty day
draft drawn by Stevens on J. P. Morgan & Co., which
Morgan agreed to honor on maturity only if in funds from
proceeds of the sale of the arms. 3 *

Stevens's situation was not so secure as Eastman's. It
is true that he had a contract with Fremont to buy for
$110,000 arms that were costing him $57,500 plus the ex-
pense of alterations. But he had a $37,500 maturity to
meet on August 27, under pain of forfeiting his rights; he
had to deliver the arms, duly altered, to Fremont in great
haste; and in a period of national stress and confusion he
had to get his money from the Government.

As for Morgan, he was custodian of the arms and he
had a part in getting them altered properly. This meant
that his $20,000 loan was increased slightly by advances to
pay for insurance, shipping and carting charges, and a
portion of the costs of alterations. Since he had a first lien
on arms worth at least several times the amount of his
advances, his position was assured regardless of the
Fremont contract. Consequently there is no necessity to
assume knowledge on his part of the Fremont contract to
explain his $20,000 advance. Later he kept himself inde-
pendent of that contract, when 2,500 of the carbines were
finally shipped to Missouri, by refusing to let the remaining
arms go forward until payment for the earlier lot had been
received. 35

How Stevens Encounters Difficulties, and

Falls into the Clutches of Ketchum

Stevens, it seems, was elated by the deal he had put over.
It got around that he was bragging of the money he had
made on a shipment of arms to Fremont; street rumor
placed the figure at $60,000. The story reached Hagner,
whose indignation it aroused. 38 At the same time Stevens
began to display a burst of activity in the arms market, and
he irritated Hagner further by seeking the latter's help,
representing himself as Fremont's agent, but taking offense
when asked for his credentials and refusing to show them.
Along in the middle of August we find him in St. Louis, at
Fremont's headquarters. In that maelstrom of activity and
confusion, we catch a glimpse of him on Sunday, August 18,
receiving an oral appointment from Fremont's private
secretary as aide-de-camp to the General with rank of
major, and being paraded out of the General's headquarters
through men with their swords drawn. (Later, on the floor
of the House, a witty and scathing critic described this
extraordinary scene and observed that the swords "were
very properly drawn", he presumed. 37 ) We see him select-
ing a sword for himself, symbol of his rank, in the St. Louis
arsenal, but apparently not paying for it as rules required. 88
(Possibly, however, the sword was turned in again.)
Thenceforth for the rest of his life he was "Major Stevens",
and, back in New York, he engaged busily, though not on a
large scale, in procuring arms as Fremont's representative,
this time supplied with letters and telegrams confirming his
authority. He received no compensation as major, nor com-
mission on his purchases ; and, for reasons that can only be
guessed, his unregularized position on Fremont's staff ter-
minated on September 20.*

Meanwhile trouble was brewing for him. The rifling
and chambering of the Hall's carbines were not progressing
with the promised dispatch. It will be recalled that Stevens
had wired Fremont on August 7 that the alterations would
be finished in ten days, and Stevens had to pay Eastman the

19

20 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

balance of Ms purchase price $37,500011 August 27. Of the
5,000 guns, 4,000 were being altered "by a leading gunsmith,
William Marston, for 75 cents each in his works at Second
Avenue and 2ist Street. The other thousand "were shipped
to the Taunton Locomotive Works in Massachusetts, where
the alteration in the arms was completed at a cost of $773
on August 23. Marston received his first batch of 1,000 arms
on August 10, and similar instalments on August 21, 24, and
29.* The first shipment of 500 carbines went forward by
Adams's Express to Fremont about August 23, and by about
the end of the month, 2,500 arms in all were on their way. a

Stevens by now was embarrassed financially. Eastman
was hounding him for his overdue $37,500. Morgan would
not let any more carbines out of his control until the first
2,500 were paid for; and while payment for these at $22
each (a total of $55,000) would cover twice over what he
owed Morgan, who had first claim, it would not leave enough
to pay Eastman. Eastman was firm; Stevens had forfeited
his rights by default. And so we find Stevens casting about
for more money to save Ms position. Morgan would lend
him no more; in fact, before the end of August he was call-
ing for repayment of what he had already lent. 4 *

The strained relations of late August between Morgan
and Stevens and between Eastman and Stevens merely carry
forward and confirm the earlier evidence that these men,
virtual strangers, were dealing with each other at arm's
length, and had no partnership, or quasi-partnership,
together. In the whole record of the Hall carbine affair,
there is no important feature on which both direct and cir-
cumstantial evidence is more conclusive than this.

That Morgan, whose advance was quite safe, was press-
ing Stevens for repayment soon after he made his loan, and
long before there was any public scandal, lends color to the
supposition that he learned of the Fremont contract only
after he had made his loan and that> though his money was
secure, he was eager to finish with the deal

In the midst of Stevens's embarrassment, Major Hub-
bard bobs up again. He had been looking to Stevens for a

STEVENS PALLS INTO DIFFICULTIES 21

substantial finder's commission in the business, and now
Stevens was being squeezed out. He seems to have told
Eastman that Stevens had promised him half of his profits.* 3
To keep in the picture, he now assured Eastman that he
would take over the business, and would introduce him to a
man who would pay him off, Eastman was asking for noth-
ing better, and accordingly Hubbard presented him to sev-
eral persons and among them to Morris Ketchum, senior
partner of the important private banking firm of Ketchum,
Son & Co., 40 Exchange Place. Ketchum called over at his
young neighbor Mr. Morgan's and examined the documents,
which consisted of course of the exchange of telegrams
between Stevens and Fremont and which he deemed entirely
satisfactory. But Ketchum shied away from the business.
He did not know either Eastman or Hubbard, and he could
not see what Hubbard contributed to the transaction. Fur-
thermore, the arms seemed to belong to Stevens and were
held by Morgan; so why deal with Eastman? He would not
touch the business. He told them Stevens was the man to
deal with.

A few days later Stevens turned up in Ketchum's office,
not with Hubbard or Eastman, nor yet with Morgan, but
with a letter of introduction that made a great impression
on Ketchum. It was from George Opdyke, a prominent mer-
chant of the city and a leading Republican who a few months
later was to be elected mayor of New York, the first
Republican mayor. This time Ketchum paid attention. On
the strength of the letter of introduction and of the docu-
ments he agreed to lend Stevens money, subject to the prior
claim of Morgan. 44 Morgan knew Ketchum well. If Morgan
was at odds with Stevens over the sale to Fremont, this
would explain why not he but another had to introduce
Stevens to Ketchum.

On Saturday, September 7, Ketchum advanced to
Stevens $46,226.31, of which $37,500 went to pay off East-
man, who endorsed and handed over to Ketchum the past-
due draft on Morgan that he had been holding. 45 From
then on Eastman disappears from the scene.

22 THE HALL CARBINE AFPAIE

At this time half of the arms had already reached
Fremont, and payment was being awaited. Morgan, eager
to be reimbursed, was holding back the rest of the arms.
On September 10 word came by telegraph that the voucher
for the first half had been paid in St. Louis, and Morgan
immediately released for shipment the rest of the arms.
Ketchum was now willing to pay off Morgan, who was
impatient to be out, and take over his position in the busi-
ness, when on Saturday, September 14, the very day that
he planned to do so, the draft from St. Louis reached
Morgan. It had been made out for $55>55, the net pro-
ceeds being $54,994.50. Deducting $26,343.54 that was due
him, Morgan handed over the balance of $28,650.96 to
Ketchum on Monday, September 16. Morgan's interest in
the Hall carbine transaction was liquidated. 43 We have
Stevens's sworn testimony that Morgan had no participation
in the deal beyond the repayment of his loan with interest,
plus compensation for his services. This was never dis-
puted by any witness, and is supported by all the evidence.

Of the $26,343.54 that Morgan received, apparently
$156.04 represented interest on his advances and $5,400 was
commission/ 7 The interest was calculated at 7 per cent.,
which was the going rate at the time, and also the legal
rate f as one member of the House Investigating Committee
put it, 7 per cent, was "the ordinary rate". 49 From a bank-
ing point of view, a 7 per cent, loan secured by arms was
not an attractive transaction in August 1861. In the middle
of the last century, when the dearth of capital was acute,
high rates of interest and high risks were the rule. And in
August 1 86 1 the money market was difficult. In the middle
of the month the federal government had trouble in selling
at par to banks an issue of $50,000,000 three year notes bear-
ing 7-3 P^r cent, interest, and succeeded only by agreeing to
leave the proceeds of the loan on deposit for weeks. The
notes appear to have fallen to a discount of several points
immediately. 50 Morgan's commission of $5,400 was addi-
tional compensation. While there is nothing in the record
to show how this sum was agreed upon, it is reasonable to
suppose that a personal loan in the troubled month of

STEVENS FALLS INTO DIFFICULTIES 23

August 1 86 1 would naturally carry a bonus, and especially
so when it involved the trouble and responsibility entailed
in handling carbines, supervising their alteration, and see-
ing that they reached their destination. It seems likely that
the total number of arms pledged with Morgan was 5,400,
and the additional compensation in that case was $1.00
per gun. 51

As for Hubbard, he did not let himself be shaken off
easily. He appears to have pestered Ketchum to the limit
of his patience, for Ketchum on October 8 was describing
him as "a kind of blackmail man". 62 Hubbard also kept
after Stevens, who promised him early in September that if
the transaction came out satisfactorily and without any
more of his "officious intermeddling", he would pay him
$2,500." As matters turned out, it seems unlikely that
Hubbard got anything.

As for Ketchum, he showed surprising liberality in
his advances to Stevens. By October 2 he had lent him
$55,415.25 in cash. After he got the surplus of $28,650.96
from the first voucher paid by Fremont, his net cash ad-
vance was reduced to $26,764.29. In addition, he "accepted"
a draft drawn by Simon Stevens in favor of one Jacob
Griel for $12,000, to be paid only when in funds from the
carbines. On these advances, including the unpaid "accept-
ance", Ketchum was charging 7 per cent, interest and a
commission. When testifying on October 8, 1861, before
the House Investigating Committee, Ketchum refused to
disclose the amount of the commission on the ground that
such a disclosure would be an invasion of his "private
business, which I think the government has no right to
inquire into". But after the Committee in December had
questioned his right to recover his money, he sought an
opportunity to testify again, and on January 23, after sharp
questioning and much evasion, he informed the Committee
in a letter that he had agreed to charge Stevens a commis-
sion not to exceed 13% per cent. He now contented him-
self with figuring his commission at 5 per cent, based on
the total of his cash advances, including the large part
that had been quickly paid off, and the "acceptance" in

24 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

favor of Griel.** (The $12,000 "acceptance" in favor of
Griel, on which Ketchum charged interest at 7 per cent,
per annum and a flat commission of 5 per cent, involved
no outlay of funds and no risk. It was not a true accept-
ance, being only a contingent liability.) Ketchum justified
his charges on the ground that in a transaction of this kind
the consignee might reject the goods, leaving him, as he
said, with the "elephant"; but he also held, inconsistently,
that this was hardly a serious risk, as half of the arms had
been accepted before Ketchum advanced his money, and
the other half of identical quality were in Fremont's hands
within a week. Ketchum, a banker of large experience,
was in possession of all the facts, yet he could stomach the
transaction. He took advantage of the circumstances to
squeeze Stevens.

The fact is that Stevens's early elation over his deal
had been premature. Before the month of August was out,
he had had to place himself in the hands of Ketchum to
save what he could of his interest in the business, and
Ketchum saw to it that Stevens was going to save little.

The Timely Intervention of John T. Howard

The main theatre of war had shifted by September
1 86 1 from the Potomac to Missouri, where Fremont was
struggling against enemies threatening him from the South
and against rising dissatisfaction with his leadership In
his own camp. The war news filling the newspapers of
the North dealt largely with him and his problems. His
popularity had lost its pristine bloom when General Lyon,
a dashing officer who had captured the public's imagina-
tion, fell at Wilson's Creek, in southwest Missouri, on
August 10 ; there were many, ignoring the difficulties that
beset Fremont on every hand, who were positive he should
have re-enforced Lyon's command in time to avert the
tragedy. At the end of August Fremont allowed himself
to issue a premature emancipation proclamation for the
territory under his jurisdiction, and his prestige suffered
when President Lincoln, for weighty reasons, repudiated
it publicly. The all-powerful Blair family of Missouri,
originally his stanchest backers, turned against him.
Another crushing blow was the encirclement by the enemy
of Colonel Mulligan's forces at Springfield, Missouri, and
their capitulation on September 20. There began to be talk
of Fremont's lavish expenditures, and of the exotic uni-
forms and imperial mannerisms affected by his entourage.
He gathered around him some of his old friends from
California, and his detractors assailed their characters
mercilessly. As the attacks grew more savage, his par-
tisans grew more vigorous in his defense. For months the
polemic was to rage, furious and bitter.

Meanwhile, behind the stirring news and public discus-
sions of the day, Stevens had been intent on getting his
carbines properly delivered to the army in the West and
collecting his money. He succeeded in delivering his car-
bines, but many years were to elapse and the Civil War
was to become a thing of the past before he received the
price that Fremont had agreed to pay.

25

26 THE HALL CAEBINE AFFAIE

The records disclose In detail what took place in St
Louis when the carbine account was presented for pay-
ment, and the circumstances shed light on the Hall carbine
episode and its subsequent history. 55

When the first instalment of 2,500 carbines had gone
forward, Stevens appears to have drawn a draft for
$55,550 on General Fremont, accompanied by an itemized
bill, the total amount being made up of $55?ooo for the guns
at $22 each, $500 for 125 packing boxes at $4 each, and
$50 for freight. In accordance with the terms on which
he had contracted his $20,000 loan on August 7, Stevens
made out both draft and bill in favor of his banker, J.
Pierpont Morgan. Morgan held the carbines as security
for his loan, and the proceeds from their sale therefore
were to go first to him to repay the loan.

On or about September 7, one John T. Howard called
at the office of Captain F. D. Callender at the St Louis
Arsenal with Stevens's draft and bill The two men went
over to Callender's quarters to avoid interruption, and
there filled out a Government voucher in the proper form
for payment. But at that moment Callender had no funds
to meet it,

A day or so after Callender had formally refused pay-
ment for want of funds, he received an urgent summons to
report at Fremont's headquarters, and there he found
Howard. Together they went to the quarters of Captain
Parmenas T Turnley, the Assistant Quartermaster, who on
Fremont's order or request turned over to Callender
$82,662.50 of the quartermaster department's funds, of
which $55,550 was used to meet Stevens's bill. (The balance
was applied to two other accounts in the name of one John
Hoey. 55 ) Turnley drew a draft on the United States
Assistant Treasurer in New York in favor of Morgan, and
Howard receipted the Government voucher for it, although
(and this became significant later) it was understood at the
time that he had no power of attorney for Morgan and that
the receipt would have to be regularized. Howard was
displaying considerable activity as a member of Fremont's
entourage in pushing this and some other accounts. To

TIMELY INTERVENTION OF MR. HOWARD 27

Callender he explained Fremont's transfer of the Quarter-
master's funds to the Ordnance Department on the ground
that Fremont was anxious for the Stevens draft not to be
protested. News of the payment of this voucher (which we
shall call Voucher No. i) on September 10 was doubtless
telegraphed to New York, for the second batch of 2,500
carbines went forward immediately and reached St. Louis
by Sunday, September 15. By that time the check for
$55>55o had reached Morgan, whose claim of $26,343.54 in
the Hall carbine transaction it liquidated and who on
Monday the :6th handed over the balance to Ketchum, as
the party next in interest.

Who was this man Howard that intervened so efficaci-
ously on Stevens's behalf? Callender testified later that
Howard had been frequenting Fremont's headquarters and
"seemed to be, at least/' a friend of the General's. He
carried a courtesy title of "Colonel", perhaps after the style
of "Major" Stevens. Ketchum said afterwards that he had
never met the man. Hagner, in testifying on October 9,
linked Howard and Stevens together as two arms buyers
whose names he had been hearing mentioned every day,
although he did not know who Howard was. 57 Some months
later Fremont published a mass of documentary material in
defense of his command of the Western Department, and
among the papers was this isolated item relating to
Howard:" 8

The following dispatch was sent to Mr. J. T. Howard, of New
York, who, at General Fremont's request, was endeavoring to procure
certain arms from the Union Defense Committee of that city:

St. Louis, August 13, 1861
To J. T. Howard:

Dispatch received. Send the arms without further bargaining,
and also send your address. Ship per Adams & Co/s fast freight,
who collect here on delivery. Good men are losing their lives, while
the men whom they defend are debating terms. Answer.

J. (X FREMONT
Major General Commanding

28 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

How clearly those lines reveal Fremont's state of mind at
the time of the carbine purchase! There is no reason,
however, to link this telegram with Stevens's carbines.

Fortunately, a great deal more is known about Howard
than the Hall carbine records disclose. A little more than
three years afterwards Fremont as a witness in a celebrated
libel suit had occasion to explain that he had met John
Tasker Howard in the election campaign of 1856, and that
their relations became "quite intimate and confidential", 50
In 1925 Howard's son, John Raymond Howard, published
a volume of reminiscences that sheds further light on
Howard's role. 60 J. T. Howard came of an old merchant
and shipping family. He himself was a founder of the
Plymouth Church in Brooklyn, and one of the intimate
friends of Henry Ward Beecher. In the early '50*5 he
became a promoter, and in 1855 began to interest himself
in financing Fremont's Mariposa mining property. In the
campaign of 1856 he spent, according to his son, some
$40,000 of his own money on Fremont's behalf. He was
much in California and came to be regarded as a Cali-
fornian. He was with Frfeiont in Europe during the
spring of 1 86 1. He and his boy John Raymond Howard,
then 24 years old, joined Fremont in St. Louis on August
16, 1861, immediately after the dispatch quoted above. His
son writes that Fremont placed his father in charge of the
shipment of arms that had been bought for the equipment
of the Missouri troops. Stevens, as we have seen, was in
St. Louis on August 18; may they not have gone west
together ?

At any rate, three weeks later Howard was busy arrang-
ing for the payment of Stevens's draft. Howard's son
comments on his father's "quick eye to practical matters".
What practical interest may he have had in collecting
Stevens's money? An hypothesis presents itself that would
explain what went on in St. Louis.

Stevens's draft for the first shipment of 2,500 carbines
was for $55,550* But it will be recalled that the net pro-
ceeds received by Morgan were only $54,994.50. There had
been a discount of $555-50, or exactly one per cent. In those

TIMELY INTERVENTION OF ME. HOWARD 29

days banks charged a fee for remitting funds from one part
of the country to another, which was called an exchange
charge; but in this case the discount could not be laid to
exchange, for the draft was drawn in New York funds and
no transfer was involved. Later in the records we find the
discount on this first draft called "express charges" ;* but
this term is baffling, because the freight charges of $50 were
included in the bill, and express charges, if any, were for
Fremont's account. 62 Is it not likely that Stevens employed
Fremont's friend Howard to push the collection of his bill,
and that Howard's quick eye to practical matters yielded
him a commission as collecting agent? The maintenance of
Fremont's credit standing may have been his primary
interest, but a fee from Stevens did not add to the Govern-
ment's costs.

Wherein Stevens Turns a Letter

to Account in a Surprising Way

When Howard collaborated with Captain Callender in
preparing Voucher No. i for payment, the two men appar-
ently drew up in tentative form a second incomplete voucher
that was to be used to cover the second instalment of 2,500
arms. This Voucher No. 2 was also of course made out
in favor of Morgan. A few days later Stevens appeared
in St. Louis and asked Captain Callender to include in the
tentative incomplete Voucher No. 2 some additional items
(screwdrivers, wipers, spring vises, and bullet molds) that
were accompanying the arms, raising the total of Voucher
No. 2 to $58,175. With every Hall carbine there were sup-
posed to go one screwdriver and one wiper; with every
ten carbines, one spring vise and one bullet mould. And in
addition, every twenty carbines called for a packing box. 63

The history of these appendages (as they were called
in ordnance terminology) provides a piquant condiment to
the carbine transaction. It appears that when Captain
Whiteley at the arsenal on Governor's Island received his
instructions late in June to sell the Hall carbines to East-
man, he wrote to the Ordnance Department in Washington
inquiring whether the customary appendages and pack-
ing boxes accompanying these arms should be included in
the price of $3.50 each, or should be charged separately.
Receiving no reply, he let the appendages go without billing
them extra. Shortly before August 20, when some of the
carbines were still on hand in the arsenal waiting for
Eastman to take them away, Washington at last got around
to answering WMteley's letter, and instructed him to
"charge a fair valuation for the appendages and packing
boxes". The delay in the answer speaks for the conditions
prevailing at that time in the Ordnance Department. It
also shows that even in August, when reminded of the
affair, the Ordnance Department did not awake to its own
folly in making the sale.

STEVENS TURNS A TRICK 31

Whiteley immediately wrote Eastman the following
letter :

New York Arsenal, August 20, 1861.

Sir: I have been instructed by General J. W. Ripley, chief of the
Ordnance department, to charge you a fair valuation for the ap-
pendages accompanying the Hall's carbines, and the boxes in which
they were packed, purchased by you from the United States. The
cost is as follows, viz:

5,067 screwdrivers, at 25 cents each $1,266.75

5,005 wipers, at 20 cents each 1,001.00

503 spring vises, at 35 cents each 176.05

503 bullet moulds, at 50 cents each 251.50

250 packing boxes, at $4 each 1,000.00

Amount $3,695.30

These articles are all new and in good order, and will be taken
back at these prices should the arms be repurchased by the United
States. Your immediate attention to this subject is requested.

Yours, respectfully,

R. H. K. WHITELEY,
Captain of Ordnance.
Mr. A. M. Eastman,
Manchester, New Hampshire.

The concluding paragraph of Whiteley's letter suggests
that he had heard of the sale of the carbines to Fremont,
and knew the destination of the appendages. If he did,
his inaction under the circumstances speaks ill of his com-
petence.

Eastman refused to make payment, contending that
other arsenals had delivered the appendages without addi-
tional charge. Seeing that a lawsuit would be needed to
enforce his demand, Whiteley dropped the matter and the
Government got nothing. But the story did not end here.
Eastman turned around and charged Stevens the amount
that the Government was asking him, in vain, to pay. At
that moment Stevens was in a weak trading position
because he was not meeting the payment to Eastman of
$37>5oo that fell due on August 27, and he could be squeezed
out of the business. Eastman consented to waive his rights
and in return Stevens consented to pay for the appendages,

32 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

and did so, presumably out of Ketchum's advances to him.
At the same time Stevens came into possession of the
Whiteley letter, and on his visit to St. Louis in the middle
of September he turned it to account in persuading Captain
Callender to add the appendages to Voucher No. 2. Thus
Stevens's claim against the Government in the end included
$3,675.00* for appurtenances, for which he had paid East-
man $3,695.30, and for which Eastman had refused to pay
the Government a cent. Stevens established his claim on
the strength of a bill rendered by the Government that
Eastman had refused to honor.

W herein a Shuffling of Documents and a

Public Investigation Have Their Genesis

We have now reached the point in our narrative where
a confusion of documents begins to bedevil the contempo-
rary records a confusion that went far to vitiate all
contemporary judgements on the episode. Only today, by
collating the evidence in a manner that the contemporary
passions and the piecemeal disclosure of facts did not per-
mit, is it possible to discern what happened.

To speak exactly, there was a double confusion.

It will be recalled that Captain Callender paid for the
first shipment of 2,500 carbines on the strength of a
voucher for $55,55o, which we have called Voucher No. i.
J. T. Howard acknowledged receipt of the funds by signing
the voucher as attorney for Morgan, although admittedly
he had no power to do so. In due course a proper voucher
was made out and signed by James G. Goodwin, Morgan's
associate and cousin. The existence of these two vouchers,
one tentative and defective, Howard's receipt being unau-
thorized, the other correct in every particular, was the
first source of misunderstanding. For there was a slight
but important difference in the wording of the two versions.
Fremont's endorsement on the unauthorized form stated
that the arms had been bought "by my order" (Fremont's) ;
whereas in the valid voucher the arms had been bought
"by me". If the former phrase held, it was possible to
contend that Stevens had acted on Fremont's order as his
agent, in which case Stevens would be entitled merely to an
agent's commission above the price he had paid to Eastman.
But if the arms had been bought by Fremont from Stevens,
rather than by his order through Stevens, Stevens was a
principal selling goods to the Government at an agreed
price.

Voucher No. 2, covering the second shipment of 2,500
carbines, also led a double existence. It will be recalled
that Captain Callender, before the arms reached St. Louis,
drew up a draft of the second voucher with Howard's and

33

34 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

Stevens's collaboration. Of this draft he kept a copy; as
he testified later, "It was taken merely as a memorandum
to assist my recollection". 85 This copy of his, naturally,
did not bear Fremont's signature and instructions to make
payment. On October 26, 1861, he handed over his form of
Voucher No* 2 to the Congressional Investigating Com-
mittee and it became part of the public record.

In due course, when the second batch of arms had
reached the arsenal in St. Louis, Fremont signed Voucher
No. 2. This was on September 26, 1861. Callender had no
funds with which to pay this Voucher No. 2, and therefore
it was sent, properly executed, to Morgan, the payee, as
evidence of the receipt of the merchandise listed in it. 69
Morgan had had his loan paid off out of the proceeds of the
first voucher, and as he had no further interest in the
transaction, he promptly handed Voucher No. 2 over to
Ketchum, for whom it was the sole security behind his out-
standing advances to Stevens. 07 The delivery of this piece
of paper to Ketchum about October i, 1861, was the last
connection that Morgan ever had with the Hall carbine
affair.

Ketchum did not long retain Voucher No. 2. It came to
him made out in Morgan's name, but assigned in such a way
that Ketchum could collect it. (Whether there was a formal
assignment is not certain. 68 ) As an active banker in New
York, Ketchum was well acquainted with the officials in
the sub-treasury there, and shortly after the voucher
reached him, he ran into George Harrington, Assistant
Secretary of the Treasury, who happened to be in New
York. Thinking that Harrington's good offices would facili-
tate the business, Ketchum handed over to him Voucher
No. 2, and asked him to pass it along to Simon Cameron,
Secretary of War, for settlement/ 9 A few days later this
must have been early in October 1861 Stevens was in
Washington, and with Harrington went to see Cameron. 70
The Secretary had the voucher in his hands during their
talk, and promised he would give the matter his attention
and write Harrington the next day. He never wrote, and
in fact the voucher itself mysteriously dropped out of sight

A SHUFFLING OF DOCUMENTS 35

in the War Department files, only to turn up many months
later. During the period of its disappearance, the authori-
ties chose to pretend that Voucher No. 2 existed only in the
form of the imperfect draft that Captain Callender had
kept in his own files as an aide-memoire for himself. 71

It is not difficult to surmise what stayed the Secretary's
hand. The enormity of the Hall carbine case how the
Government was buying for more than $22 arms that it
had just sold for $3.50 was dawning on the consciousness
of officialdom and public alike. On Wednesday, September
25, General Ripley had before him an estimate of funds,
forwarded by Captain Callender, that the St. Louis arsenal
needed in order to pay for arms already bought. 72 The
estimate included an item of $22.50 [sic] for some Hall
carbines. One can imagine the sinking feeling that Ripley
must have had when the suspicion first came to him that
these were the carbines he himself had sold. He immedi-
ately addressed a memorandum to the Secretary of War,
and its substance appeared on Thursday morning in the
newspapers the first news item on the Hall carbine affair. 7 *

In his memorandum Ripley called attention to the exces-
sive price of the Hall arms, which "only cost $17.50 when
new, an arm which has been rejected from the U. S.
military service after trial, and many of which have been
condemned as unsuitable for public service and sold at
auction at $6 and under." Furthermore, he said he knew
of no authority for Fremont's purchases, because under the
terms of an act passed in 1815 ordnance stores had to be
contracted for through the senior ordnance officer. This
rule, of course, Fremont had not observed.

On the next day, Friday, September 27, Major Hagner
was telling a House investigating committee in New York
behind closed doors what he knew or suspected about
Stevens : how Stevens had been milling around in the arms
market; how Stevens had tried to consult with him and
had made a mystery of his exact relations with Fremont ;
how Stevens, according to street rumor, was boasting of
the profit he had made on one of his arms transactions. On
October 4 Eastman and Stevens were testifying, and Morris

36 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIE

Ketchum on October 8. Hagner had more derogatory
things to say to the Committee about Stevens on the 9th,
and later in the month the Committee were sitting in
St. Louis listening to Captain Calender's story. 74

The Committee requested the War Department to with-
hold payment, and Secretary Cameron complied with their
wishes. 75

Meanwhile Fremont's fortunes in the Western Depart-
ment were going from bad to worse. On October 14,
L. Thomas, Adjutant General of the Army, directed that
Fremont's debts be held up and forwarded to Washington
for settlement. 78 (The commitment for Hall carbines was
only a flea-bite in Fremont's finances, and probably had
nothing to do with Thomas's order.) Overwhelmed by
enemies without and enemies within, Fremont at last was
relieved of his command on November 2, 1861.

The dual existence of Voucher No. i was destined to
mislead, as we shall see, the Congressional Investigating
Committee. The dual existence of Voucher No. 2 furnished
the War Department, a little later, with a welcome though
unfair excuse for withholding final payment from Simon
Stevens. The confusion between the two vouchers, and
between the two forms of each voucher, persisted in the
public discussion to the very end. When, in July 1862, the
final sputter of newspaper comment on this obscure trans-
action in firearms broke out and died away, the point at
issue hinged on the conflicting vouchers. This final dis-
cussion, instead of clarifying the matter, left the problem
of the vouchers more muddled than it had ever been. 77

Wherein a Congressional Committee

Asks Questions and Ventures Comments

One of the unusual things about the Hall carbine case is
the promptness with which it was investigated. The car-
bines changed hands on August 7, 1861, and reached
Fremont in September. A select committee of Congress
were taking testimony and probing the transaction before
the end of September. This Committee never wrote a final
report on the affair; but on December 17, 1861, while they
were still hearing witnesses, they submitted tentative find-
ings to Congress and published them. 78

Rumors of waste and corruption in the prosecution of
the War had been current since the spring of 1861, and
when the Congress had assembled in extra session early in
July, the House had immediately created a select committee
to inquire into Government contracts. Its members, several
of whom were to have long and distinguished careers in
the public service, were: Charles H. Van Wyck of New
York, Chairman (he was diverted soon from his duties by
service under the colors, but in the final stage of the Com-
mittee's activities he returned and became a belligerent
minority of one assailing the motives of his colleagues) ;
Elihu B. Washburne of Illinois, a friend of Lincoln's and
later Minister to France ; William S. Holman of Indiana, a
"War Democrat" and later nicknamed the "Great Objector"
because of his opposition to wasteful appropriations;
Reuben E. Fenton, who a few years later became Governor
of New York State; Henry L. Dawes of Massachusetts, for
many years afterwards a leading figure in Congress;
William G. Steele of New Jersey; and James S. Jackson of
Kentucky.

The Committee went to work promptly and were sitting
in New York as early as August 27, when rumors of
Stevens's coup may have reached their ears. The examina-
tion of Major Hagner on September 27 was perhaps precipi-
tated by the Washington dispatches of September 25, dis-
closing Ripley's protest against the price paid by Fremont
for Hall's carbines.

37

38 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

The labors of the Committee extended over a period of
more than a year and covered a wide field, the purchase
of arms, of horses and hay and blankets and food; the
chartering of vessels ; the activities of sutlers in the army
camps; even the routine handling of merchandise in the
customs house in New York. The Committee were diligent
in their examination of witnesses, and the transcript of
their hearings, filling some 2,500 printed pages, is a valu-
able primary source for the history of the times. The
procedure of the Committee, which exercised the power
of subpoena, wag to take testimony in secret, submit the
transcript to the witnesses for comment and correction,
then draw up conclusions, and publish the report at the
same time as the testimony.

Of the contracts investigated by the Committee, Fre-
mont's purchase of carbines was one of the most spectacu-
lar. The Committee considered the affair remarkable in 7 '

. . . illustrating the improvidence of gentlemen prominently con-
nected with the public service [this presumably refers to Cameron,
the Secretary of War who authorized the sale, Ripley, and Fremont],
the corrupt system of brokerage by which the Treasury has been
plundered, and the prostitution of public confidence to purposes of
individual aggrandisement. . . . These arms seem to have been sold
privately, and without inviting any competition, and sold, too, for an
almost nominal price. The sale was made by order of the Secretary
of War on the recommendation of the Ordnance Bureau. No govern-
ment that ever has existed can sustain itself with such improvidence
in the management of its affairs. One agent of the government sells
these arms at $3.50 each, in the midst of a pressing demand for arms,
and, a few weeks afterwards, and without any increase in that demand
[the Committee overlooked the effect in the arms market of the battle
of Bull Bun], the same arms, slightly altered, are re-sold to the
government, through another agent, for $22 each, the government
losing in so small a transaction, if permitted to be consummated, over
ninety thousand dollars. , . . Whether buying or selling, the liberality
of the government is equally striking! . . . The arm had been
rejected from the public service as practically worthless years ago,
and in his [Ripley's] judgment no alteration could improve it; if so,
the re-purchase of the arm is without any possible excuse; if other-
wise, the original sale of the arm is utterly indefensible.

A CONGRESSIONAL INQUIRY 39

The Committee's apportionment of blame is the vital
feature of its report. There is no censure for Morgan,
under whose control "the arms were placed ... to secure
him the payment of $20,000 he had advanced to Stevens". 80
Though holding that either Fremont or Bipley must have
blundered, the Committee allowed Fremont an escape by
assuming, erroneously, that he probably labored "under
some misapprehension as to the nature of the purchase of
the arms", and softened the indictment of Eipley by calling
him "a gentleman of large experience and inexorable in
the performance of his public duties". a As we have seen,
the Committee exonerated Eastman of bad faith, but
lamented his "unfortunate eagerness to speculate on the
misfortunes of the country". 82 The burden of the Commit-
tee's indignation was visited upon Stevens.

Obviously seeking a justification for refusing to pay
Voucher No. 2, the Committee hazarded an hypothesis that
implied bad faith on Stevens's part. They asked whether
Stevens, in offering the arms to Fremont, had not been
acting as his agent rather than as a principal; if so, he
could not sell the arms to Fremont at an advance over the
price of $12.50 paid to Eastman. 83

In support of their hypothesis the Committee adduced
various pieces of evidence. They were specially impressed
by the absence of "chaffering" between Fremont and
Stevens over price. Ignoring Fremont's desperate mili-
tary exigencies, they remarked that he had accepted the
arms immediately, without consulting Major Hagner, with-
out inquiry as to the provenance of the arms, without
details about the alterations. Such conduct, the Commit-
tee thought, would be natural only between a principal and
his agent in whom he has confidence. This interpretation
was re-enforced, said the Committee, by the wording of
Voucher No. i, in which Fremont confirmed the purchase
"by my order" of the carbines. (Here the Committee relied
on the unauthorized, invalid Voucher No. i, signed by
J. T. Howard.) The case would be clinched, added the
Committee, if it could be shown that Morgan, in whose
name the vouchers were drawn, was really the seller,

40 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

because this would leave to Stevens only the role of agent.
To buttress their hypothesis further, the Committee adduced
other evidence, but of even more dubious character. They
recalled that as early as July Stevens had represented
himself orally to Major Hagner as Fremont's agent, repre-
sentations that Hagner had rightly dismissed at the time
as empty pretensions when Stevens refused to produce his
credentials. They misquoted Fremont's dispatch accept-
ing the arms. Fremont had wired: "I will take the whole
5,000 arms", but the Committee, though in possession of
this dispatch, have him say, "Purchase and forward imme-
diately . . .," as though Fremont had been giving instruc-
tions to his agent. (Ketchum in testifying had ventured
his offhand recollection of the dispatch in these words. The
Committee chose to make use of his inaccurate recollec-
tion, although they possessed the exact text and published
it elsewhere in their report. This is the only instance where
the Committee laid themselves open to a suspicion of abus-
ing the evidence to suit their purpose. 84 )

In conclusion the Committee held that the carbines were
worth "very nearly $12.50" to the government at the time
Fremont bought them, or a total of $62,500; but that this
was all the government was obliged to pay. They construed
the contract as one between Eastman and Fremont, elimi-
nating Stevens. As Voucher No. i for $55,550 had already
been paid, there was a balance due of $6,950, plus interest
since September 9, Nothing was to be paid for the append-
ages. 85

To give effect to their recommendation, the Committee
introduced the following resolution in the House: 86

EESOLTED, That the Secretary of the Treasury be requested to
adjust the claim against the government for the five thousand Hall
carbines, purchased through Simon Stevens, esq., by General John C.
Fremont, on the 6th day of August, 1861, and afterwards delivered
at the United States arsenal at the city of St. Louis, on the basis of
a sale of said arms to the government for $12.50 each, rejecting all
other demands against the government on account of the purchase of
said arms.

A CONGRESSIONAL INQUIRY 41

Note the phrase: "purchased through Simon Stevens",
rather than from him.

The Committee were clearly not convinced they were on
sound ground in calling Stevens an agent of Fremont's.
They labored their point, and they were not dogmatic about
it. They gave their case away by winding up their report
with an alternative reason for withholding payment from
Stevens a plea that consisted of this excoriation of
Stevens's conduct: 87

. . . even if Stevens is to be regarded as an independent purchaser,
that purchase was made with a view to an immediate re-sale to the
government at an enormous profit, and the committee protest against
such a transaction being treated as fair and legitimate. To drive a
hard and unconscionable bargain with a party whose pressing neces-
sities compelled compliance, has received the severest censure of the
enlightened jurists of all nations; and an act which promotes the
sordid and mercenary interests of the individual citizen at the ex-
pense of the common interest of the Commonwealth, has been
branded by the laws of most civilized countries as a crime. To seize
upon the pressing necessities of a nation, when the welfare of the
whole people are in imminent peril, and the more patriotic are sacri-
ficing life and fortune in the common cause, to gratify a voracious
cupidity and coin money out of the common grief, is a crime against
the public safety, which a sound public policy must condemn. These
transactions, where, in consequence of the urgent necessity of the
occasion, or of the improvidence or dishonesty of public agents,
enormous and exorbitant profits are attempted to be wrested from
the government, are not to be confounded with fair and legitimate
contracts and commercial transactions. These are to be sacredly
carried into effect, and the good faith which the government owes
to its honest contractors, and, indeed, to the patriotic masses of its
people, demand the application of the most rigid rules of equity to
the unconscionable and dishonest contracts by which enormous profits
are sought to be obtained from the government by a system of broker-
age unjust to fair and honest commerce, corrupting to public virtue,
discouraging to patriotism, and a burning shame and dishonor to
the country. Such, in the judgment of the committee, is the char-
acter of this transaction, where an effort is made to obtain from
the government some $49,000 over and above the value of the prop-
erty sold, and that, too, in a transaction involving property at the
very best not exceeding ?6o,ooo in value, and totally worthless if
it were not for the necessities of the moment and the misfortunes
of the country. The frequency of these transactions, instead of
extenuating the offence, demands a more prompt and public con-
demnation.

42 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

On the whole, the Committee's report was not unfair.
Their conclusions, except in their condemnation of Stevens,
were frankly tentative, based on incomplete information.

When the Committee wrote their report, they had
not yet examined Ripley. They never summoned Fremont,
though he made himself available to them in Washington
early in 1862. They never called Morgan. In their report
they paid little attention to him, and clearly did not con-
sider him important.

The Committee's suggestion that Stevens had betrayed
an agency relationship soon collapsed. Fremont in a letter
dated February 22, 1862, written for the record, stated
unequivocally that he had bought the Hall carbines "directly
from Mr. Stevens, and not through him, agreeably to the
offer of sale received from him by telegram." 88 The Fremont
letter was accepted by the War Department as final on the
subject. 89

If there had ever been room for doubt about Morgan's
role, it was cleared up on January 22, 1862, when Morris
Ketchum, re-appearing before the Committee, explained in
detail the financial relationships of everyone connected with
the transaction, and submitted a statement showing, among
other things, the liquidation of Morgan's interest by the
repayment of his advances in the middle of September .*

After the interim report of December 1861, the Com-
mittee never again reviewed the Hall carbine case formally.
The next instalment of their general report was submitted
to Congress on July 17, 1862. By that time another body
the Commission on Ordnance Claims and Contracts had
sat on the case and presented its findings, and the House
Committee contented itself with reprinting the findings of
the Commission. 81

The Hall carbine affair drew some attention in the con-
temporary press. There was a flurry of comment in late
September and in October, when Ripley discovered the price
that Fremont had paid for the arms. There was some more
comment when the House Committee's interim report was
published on December 18, and when Chairman Van Wyck
recapitulated the report on the floor of the House on

Statement of fowtaew with 8. Stemt.

1861.

Sept. 7. Advance on 5,000 carbines bought by General
Fremont of S. Stevens, say, with appurte-
nances, $113,000 $46,226 31

Sept. 9. Check (J. P.M.) 3,797 00

Sept. 16. Check (S. S.) 5,000 00

Sept. 21. Draft favor of Marston 360 00

Oct. 2. Draft favor of J. P. Morgan 31 95

Oct. 2. Draft favor of Jacob Griel 12,000 00

67,415 25
1862.

Jan. 21. Commi8mon,5perct.,on$67,415 25 $3,370 75

Interest, 9 days, on 46,225 31 80 89

136 days, on 17,575 34 461 3:

134 days, on 3,797 00 91 45

127 days, on 5,000 00 123 47

122 days, on 360 00 8 54

111 days, on 12,031 95 259 60 4,396 10

m '

Sept 16. Received from J.P.Morgan amount
of Stevens's draft on General Fre-
mont for 25,000 carbines, less ex-
press charges ........................ 54,994 50

Less Morgan's advance ....... . ...... 26,343 54

-- 28,G50 96

Balance Jue us 43^73 35

Amount of ordnance certificate, held by us as
Bilateral 5^175 oo

STATEMENT OF KETCHUM'S ACCOUNT WITH STEVENS

Submitted by Ketehum to the House Committee investigating the
transaction on January 22, 1862. [House Invest., vol 2, p. 515.]

A CONGRESSIONAL INQUIRY 43

February 7, 1862. Such attention as the incident drew can
be laid more to the Fremont controversy than to its own
merits. The newspapers hostile to Fremont among others,
the Washington Evening Star, the New York Herald, the
Chicago Tribune seized on it for ammunition against him,
expressing amazement that anyone could pay $22 for "con-
demned" and "worthless" arms; while journals friendly to
him the New York Daily Tribune, the Daily Missouri
Democrat of St. Louis, and the National Republican of
Washington emphasized the military exigencies under
which Fremont had labored, the merits of the Hall arm, and
the folly of an Ordnance chief who sold good arms for a
song in time of war. Examination of the files of a dozen
leading newspapers shows that Stevens came in for con-
siderable censure, though the Tribune put in a word even
for him; Eastman is hardly mentioned; Morgan, never. 92
On the floor of the Senate the Hall carbine transaction
appears to have been mentioned only once, on January 14,
1862. In the House it elicited considerable discussion during
March and April 1862, chiefly as a minor theme in the
Fremont debate and in the angry debates over the activities
of the House Investigating Committee. On February 10,
1862, Stevens addressed a memorial to the House defending
his conduct and protesting against the recommendation of
the House Committee to withhold payment of the balance
of his account. 95 Shortly afterwards, in a formal statement
and in testimony before another committee the Joint
Committee on the Conduct of the War Fremont defended
his record in the Western Department and, incidentally, his
purchase of the Hall carbines, which he said he understood
had never been condemned. 9 * On April 28 Thaddeus
Stevens, the Republican war-horse in the lower house,
undertook to defend Simon Stevens, a protege though not
a relative of his, conceding however that the purchase and
re-sale of the arms at a large profit was "a speculation
which may not be very pleasant to look at/ 595 On April 30,
after debate, the House approved, by a vote of 103 to 28,
the resolution recommended by the Investigating Com-
mittee. 83

44 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

Neither the discussions in the press nor the debates in
Congress add materially to our knowledge of the Hall car-
bine episode. They shed more light on the factional sym-
pathies of the day than on what happened. Fremont and
the activities of the Investigating Committee were the bones
of contention, with Stevens and Ripley incidental victims.
In Congress Morgan was mentioned only once, and that
reference is illuminating: Representative Holman of the
Investigating Committee, who was charged with making on
the floor the detailed report about the Hall carbines, said
that Stevens, the responsible party, "uses the name of
J. Pierpont Morgan, a New York broker, to cover the trans-
action/' 97 Thus the spokesman for the Committee mentioned
Morgan only to minimize his role.

Wherein a War Department Commission

Assembles Documents and Reaches Conclusions

Simon Cameron's handling of war contracts subjected
him to widespread criticism, and on January n, 1862, he
resigned, accepting, in lieu of his Cabinet position, the post
of minister to Russia, a strange berth for Pennsylvania's
political boss! Edwin M. Stanton, succeeding him as Sec-
retary of War, found the Department cluttered with a mass
of disputed contractual commitments for supplies. In order
to free himself, for the more effective prosecution of the
war, of this heritage of confusion, Secretary Stanton on
March 13 created a special Commission on Ordnance Claims
and Contracts to audit and adjust all outstanding "con-
tracts, orders, and claims". He appointed to this commis-
sion two men, Joseph Holt of Kentucky, who had served
as Secretary of War under Buchanan, and Robert Dale
Owen of Indiana, son of Robert Owen, the celebrated British
merchant and social visionary. He assigned Major Hagner
of the Ordnance Bureau to aid them. Stanton further
relieved himself of responsibility by announcing in advance
that the War Department would accept as final and con-
clusive the decisions of the commission. 98

The Ordnance Commission was not, of course, a law
court; and it had no statutory existence. It was an arm
of the War Department and a convenience for the harassed
Secretary. The Department bound itself by the findings
of the commission, but these findings were not binding on
claimants. A dissatisfied claimant could have recourse to
the courts, as in the case of other decisions of any Execu-
tive office.

On March 17 the commission invited all persons with
claims against the War Department to present them. Over
the ensuing months it considered 104 claims aggregating
about $50,000,000; and after rejecting some, curtailing or
modifying others, and allowing still others, the commission
reduced the liability to about $34,000,000, subject in certain
cases to appeals to the courts.** The commission's general
report on its labors was published early in July 1862, but

45

46 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

the decisions in the individual cases along with the sup-
porting documentation did not become available until later,
and their ultimate publication appears to have passed
unnoticed by the press.

General Fremont's purchase of Hall carbines appears
in the record of the Ordnance Commission under this
heading:

CASE NO. 97-
J. PIEKPONT MORGAN

The use of Morgan's name, rather than Stevens's or
Ketchum's, was natural though inaccurate. As the opening
page of the commission's complete report on the Hall
carbine case shows, Stanton handed over to Holt and Owen
the valid form of Voucher No* 2. Since it bore Morgan's
name as payee, it automatically gave Morgan's name to the
claim. Thus the name of the dossier was lifted from the
name on the Government voucher. But the commission
was never in doubt about the identity of the true claimants :
their analysis dealt throughout with Stevens and Ketchum.
Morgan addressed no communications to the commission,
nor did he ever appear before it, in person or by attorney.
The opening words of the commission's findings accurately
state Morgan's connection with the transaction:

The purchase was not made from the claimant, J. Pierpont Mor-
gan, but from Simon Stevens. Morgan having loaned Stevens money,
the carbines passed into the possession of Morgan as a security for
the advance thus made, and were by him delivered to General
Fremont, under the sale made by Stevens to him; and the bills against
the government were made out in favor of Morgan.

Nowhere else does the commission discuss Morgan, much
less criticise his role in the business, and he is mentioned
only occasionally. 100

That Ketchum, even more than Stevens, was the active
claimant is abundantly clear from the exhibits published
with the commission's report. 101 On March 28, 1862, John
J. Cisco, the Assistant Treasurer of the United States resi-
dent in New York, gave Ketchum a letter of introduction to
Holt, and in addition wrote Holt personally commending
Ketchum in glowing terms. 102 On or before April 4 Ketchum
in a personal interview asked Stanton to refer the Hall

460 REPORT OF THE COMMISSION.

CASE No 37.

J. t*IBRPONT MOROAN.

[In Jurw-ment. ]

The within claim i* wfrrt^d to Hon. Jowph Holi and Robert Dalo 0wca,
ia! coTmmsion*ii*, for investigation and rcpori.

KIAYIN M. STANTON.

Secretary *>f War.

The l/nittd Staif* to J. P. Morgan, Dr.

ORDrtAivce STORES.
1861.

Augiut 7. 2,500 Hall'* carbines, at S22 - . 855,000

5,OOO screwdrivers, at 25 cent* 1,250

5,-OCO wiper*, at 20 cent* 1,000

500 spring* vices, at 35 cents 175

500 ballet mould*, at 50 cents 25O

125 packing boxes, at $4 500

3S.175

The annexed named ordnance stores have l<*<'ii received in j*ocl rl-r,

F. ^>. CALLKNDKK.
Captain of Ordxance, U*ited Sftt'f* Army.

HEADQI ART tfts Wfs*TKRpf DEPARTMENT,

SA JLoMtt, September ^6, 1S61.

The above ordnance was purchased by me for the troop* under my command.
Captain Call<*ndr. Ordnance department, will pay the ncoount.

.). C, FREMONT.
Ifftjor (.wTHrrttJ i'ofnntfrHfJt/tjf.

Not paid f<r wani of fundt*

F. I>. r.VL

{*aj/t<i' ttf Ordntitt* t' t Uatfftl Xtatf*

56 BR4>%i>WA^. XFA\ \ ORK. A*gv*t .*>
I have five thousand Hall'* riflod csiPt-. a tc<'l carhin*-*, bn'<Tl-londin^, m w, at
twenty -I wo dollars, governnn-nt Htamlrd. fiftv--i^lit. Can I her from j>u '

SIMON STKVKNS
J. C. KB 6 MOST.

tifraJ (J'ttminamlitnf* <.*'ttro* llh/tot*.

WEVIKRN IKP.\Rrvih\'i.
St. Jsoui** Auguxt 6. 1SGI.

I >*ill take the whole rive thousand earl/me*. Se' agents A^anjs Kxj>n-j*H. .md
send by expn-88, not faat freight. I will pay all extra clwrgv*. Sfnl nlwi
ammunition.

Devote yourself solely to that bnsineaa to-day.

J. C- FREMONT.
Major General
SIMON

FIRST PAGE OF ORDNANCE COMMISSION'S REPORT

First page of the Report on the Hall carbine case prepared by the War

Department's Commission on Ordnance Claims and Contracts. It will

be noted that the title is taken from the unpaid voucher that appears

as the first exhibit. lOrd. Rcp., p. 460.]

THE WAR DEPARTMENT INVESTIGATES 47

carbine claim to the commission, and he then appeared
before the commission himself, submitting his papers to
them and being examined by them. On April n he
addressed a long letter to the commission setting forth his
claim in the strongest terms. 103 On April 19 Holt wrote
Ketchum asking for any evidence that he might care to
offer as to the actual value of the arms. 104 In reply Ketchum
on May 2 sent Holt affidavits of certain arms experts on
the subject. 105 On May 15, in response to a request of the
commission, Stevens submitted a mass of material giving
details about his connection with the transaction. 108 Stevens
had testified before the commission on April 14, and East-
man appeared on June 4 and 5. 1OT The commission handed
down its decision in this case on June 12, though it appears
not to have been published until some weeks later. While
the commission had the case under advisement, at least
two lengthy anonymous letters appeared in the press defend-
ing Ketchum's position, apparently written with a view to
influencing Holt and Owen. 108 In all the testimony and
documentation supporting the claim, Morgan never figures
in person or by proxy as a principal; and his name appears
only rarely and incidentally.

The commission held that the Government was under a
legal obligation to pay for the carbines, not because of the
contract between Stevens and Fremont, but because the
arms passed into the public service and were used as public
property. The amount of the obligation was the fair market
value at the time of sale of the carbines. The commission
found the fair market value to be :

Amount received by Eastman $57,500.00

plus cost of appendages . 3,695.30

plus cost of alterations 4,032.75

Total $65,228.05

As ?55,55o had already been paid to Stevens, this left a
balance due him of $9,678.05. (It will be noted that, even
if no payment had previously been made, the settlement
recommended by the commission would have sufficed more
than twice over to pay off Morgan.)

48 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

Having decided that a fair market value of the arms had
been $65,228.05, the commission further held that a broker-
age fee of 2j4 per cent., or $i,33<>*7 > was payable. The
payment was to be made to Morgan, the nominal claimant,
in return for his receipt in full against all claims connected
with the affair.

The commission's digest of the evidence, on which its
recommendations were based, is marred, as we shall now
see, by extraordinary factual lapses prejudicial to Stevens
and Ketchum. The House of Representatives on April 30
had recommended that the Government should adjust
Stevens's claim on the basis of $12.50 for each carbine; and
perhaps the weight of this political request warped the
judicial faculty of the commission.

It will be recalled that the House investigating commit-
tee hazarded the surmise that Stevens had been acting as
Fremont's agent. The War Department commission dis-
missed this supposition as unfounded. But it held that the
Stevens-Fremont contract was "without sanction of law,
invalid, and null", because under a military law of 1815
Fremont had authority to acquire arms only through the
Chief of Ordnance, and because he had received no special
delegation of authority to effect purchases that would have
over-ridden the limitation on his powers contained in the
1815 statute. Therefore, the commission went on to say, any
rights that the claimants might possess would have to be
founded on considerations of equity. But the commission
found that in equity Stevens's case suffered under two
counts. Fremont had bought the arms looking to instant
delivery, whereas Stevens did not ship the last lot for forty
days. (The commission ignored the fact that Fremont had
expressly waived his request for instant delivery by his dis-
patches of August 7 and 8, and that by accepting the arms
he again waived any objections on that score.) Secondly,
the commission charged Stevens with bad faith because
when he offered the arms to Fremont he knew they were
the property of the Government. (This assertion as to
Stevens's knowledge flew in the face of the sworn, unchal-
lenged testimony of both Stevens and Eastman; and what

THE WAR DEPARTMENT INVESTIGATES 49

is equally important, it disregarded the internal evidence
showing that the relations of the two men at the time of the
contract between them were such as to render a priori
unlikely such knowledge on the part of Stevens.)

To arrive at a fair market value for the arms, the com-
mission hit on an ingenious solution : it adopted

the terms ... of the contract of August i, 1861, between two shrewd
business men, one agreeing to sell, and the other to buy, 5,000 of
these carbines, rifled, at twelve dollars and fifty cents, the expense
of the rifling and breech enlarging, estimated at one dollar per
carbine, being deducted.

In other words it made use of the Eastman-Stevens contract
to decide on a fair price for the Stevens-Fremont sale. (The
fallacy here is obvious Eastman, owing to the precarious
status of his purchase from the Government and his lack of
money, had not been in a position to make the most of the
market. Whatever opinion one may hold of Eastman's
conduct, it is clear that his trading position was disadvan-
tageous, and the price he was willing to accept was no
criterion of values.)

The commission closed its report with a courteous but
unfavorable analysis of Ketchum's plea for payment as an
innocent third party. The report pointed out that Ketchum
had declined to disclose the terms of his advances to
Stevens; and that from this one could infer that the terms,
if they had been disclosed, would have evidenced doubts as
to the sufficiency of the security, and would have indicated
that the confidence claimed to have been felt had been
largely mingled with distrust. (The commission in this
case was making a shrewd thrust, and a justified one, except
that they chose to ignore Ketchum's subsequent disclosure
of the terms.)

The report then went on to say:*

It is true, that while the house in question (Messrs. Zetchum,
Son & Co.) admit that the security on which the advances were
made was General Fremont's telegraphic despatch, backed by a
private note of introduction, they allude, in the conclusion of their
statement above cited, to the large sums advanced by banks and

* The name In parentheses in the first sentence appears thus in the official document

50 THE HALL CABBINE AFFAIR

bankers on "certified certificates." But no certified certificate, except
for the sum actually paid, namely, fifty-five thousand five hundred
and fifty dollars, is to be found in this case. There exists, for the
fifty-eight thousand one hundred and seventy-five dollars claimed,
only a partially filled up form of voucher, bearing an acknowledg-
ment of the receipt of the arms in good order, signed by the ordnance
officer at St. Louis, but showing (as the blank spaces disclose) that
the required certificate that "the account is correct and just," is
filled up by no amount, and remained unsigned by any one; showing,
also, that the certificate, apparently prepared for General Fremont's
signature, to the effect that "the arms were purchased for the troops
under his command" was not signed by that officer. Thus, even if
this quasi voucher may have been taken into account by Ketchum,
Son <& Co., in making some of their later advances, its very appear-
ance was suggestive of the necessity of caution and inquiry regard-
ing it. Nor has it, in point of fact, been shown that it was so taken
into account.

On the strength of this paragraph, it is hard not to convict
the commission of wilful deception. The pretense that
Voucher No. 2 existed only in an incomplete form was belied
by the presence of the authentic voucher among the exhibits
in the possession of the commission itself, which some time
later it proceeded to publish. The Secretary of War had
himself submitted the voucher in its complete form to the
commission for adjustment. 109

Ketchum later expressed a willingness to accept the
commission's offer of payment, but only if acceptance of the
amount awarded would not be construed as a waiver of
further rights. This the Government refused to concede. 310
Stevens and Ketchum proceeded in due time to take their
case to court.

The Court Speaks

Simon Stevens did not bring his suit against the United
States until after the Civil War. In the fall of 1866 he
petitioned the Court of Claims to render judgement direct-
ing the United States to pay him the amount due him under
Voucher No. 2 $58,175.00 plus interest from September
20, 1 86 1. The depositions of witnesses were taken in New
York late in December and during the early months of 1867.
Ripley and Eastman did not testify, but all the other prin-
cipal figures in the Hall carbine transaction Stevens,
Fremont, and Ketchum were examined, as well as many
of the minor participants. Morgan was not among them.
Briefs were filed, and the Court of Claims handed down its
judgement on May 6, i867. m

The Assistant Solicitor of the United States, in defend-
ing the case, did not allege that there had been any fraud.
The Government passed over entirely the suggestion of the
House Investigating Committee that Stevens had been act-
ing as agent; no grounds existed on which to base this
contention. It did not impugn either of the vouchers cov-
ering the shipment of the arms, both of which in their
correct forms were incorporated in the court record. The
Government based its defense on three contentions:

1. That a major general had not, by virtue of his office
as a military commander of a department, authority to
make the purchase of the arms. All purchases of arms
should have been made through the Ordnance Department.
Fremont had made no application to the Ordnance Depart-
ment in Washington, and he could not dispense with the
requirement of the law until he had failed to procure the
needed supplies in the regular way.

2. That Fremont had not derived authority to make
the purchase from any instructions or orders given to him
by the President of the United States.

3. 'That the claimant had already been paid as much
as the arms were reasonably worth.

52 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

By a three to one decision the Court rendered judge-
ment for Stevens in the sum of $58>t75 The judgement
did not include the interest for which Stevens had sued.

In his Opinion Judge Peck discussed the defendant's
first two points together. He held that whereas an ordnance
officer was a special agent of the Government with restricted
authority, an officer commanding a department was a gen-
eral agent, and by usage and common understanding was
empowered to perform all the duties of special agents, such
as ordnance officers. What a subordinate could do, he
could do. Perhaps it was true that General Fremont had
not made a formal demand on the ordnance officers for
the arms in question, but this was not a fact that the claim-
ant was bound to inquire into. Furthermore, such a
demand would have been unavailing, as the Ordnance
Bureau could not have met it, and the failure to make
it was therefore excused, "for the law does not require
the performance of a useless act". The Court held there
might be a presumption that a commanding general, who
is directed to organize an army, would have authority to
procure arms when and where he could. The omission
to do so would bring upon him something more serious
than reproach. "It may well be said that the bargain made
by General Fremont was not more unusual than the times
which begat it; and much may be overlooked in an omis-
sion to regard forms, if we reflect upon the urgency of the
occasion."

As for the contention of the Government that Stevens
had already been adequately compensated, the Court after
summarizing the evidence went straight to the point:

This record abounds in evidence showing that the carbines were of
good quality, that twenty-two dollars each was a fair market price for
them, and that there was a great demand for and a great scarcity
of fire-arms in the market.

The opinion of the Court, which fills several pages,
mentions Morgan only once, in a passing reference to
Voucher No. i, which had been paid. 118

THE COURT SPEAKS 53

At the request of Secretary Stanton but against "the
well-instructed judgement of all the Solicitors of the United
States"," 4 the Government made a motion for an appeal
on June 10, 1867, and it was allowed on June 26. The case
was not called up at the ensuing term of the Supreme
Court, and on August 11, 1868, when Stanton was no longer
Secretary of War, the Attorney General's office advised
the War Department to drop the appeal Pursuant to this
advice, the new Secretary of War, J. M. Schofield, requested
the Supreme Court to dismiss the appeal, which was done
on August 22/1868.

The recommendation of the Attorney General's office to
drop the case, written by Assistant Attorney General J.
Hubley Ashton, was carefully reasoned and emphatic. He
said, in part:

I concede that the case was a proper one originally for judicial
scrutiny, though it is difficult to believe that the facts before the
War Department, at the time the matter was under consideration,
did not warrant and would not have fully justified the payment of
the claim; but, after the Government had received the benefit of an
exhaustive contestation of the case, after all the circumstances out
of which the contract arose, and all the facts attending it, had been
fully disclosed by the witnesses familiar with them, upon examina-
tion and cross-examination, after an extended consideration of the
case by counsel in argument not only as presented by the testimony
in the particular cause but as affected by other and similar cases,
growing out of the administration of the Department of the West
by General Fremont, and, finally, after a pure and learned tribunal
of the Government's own selection had pronounced in favor of the
validity and meritorious character of the claim, and unanimously
[sic] concurred in recommending its payment, I apprehend that no
duty remained to the Government but to pay the claim, and thus
perform, what was, at best, at that time, but tardy justice.

Pending the disposition of the appeal, Stevens had filed
the judgement of the Court of Claims with the Treasury
on June 24, 1867. On August 24 of the following year,
immediately after the dismissal of the appeal, he was paid
$61,577.83, this amount including $3,402.83 interest at 5
per cent from the date on which the judgement had been
filed.

This was the end of the Hall carbine affair.

54 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

The verdict of the Court of Claims received more than
perfunctory notice in The New-York Times in its issue
of May 13, 1867. This newspaper, after recapitulating the
history of the case, quoted from the opinion of the Court,
and then said that the decision would "open up a wide
field for the owners of "dead-horse' claims", adding that
". . . the contractors who furnished shoddy clothing and
worthless arms to the Government, on the telegraphic
requisition of extravagant commanders, can step in and
get the satisfaction which they were denied at the War
Department/' There is no evidence that this gloomy fore-
cast was fulfilled. On the contrary, Stevens vs. U. S. had
no importance as a legal precedent. It has never been
cited by the Supreme Court, and only once by the Court
of Claims, 3 " 5 when it was used to point a contrast in adjudi-
cating a claim that was being rejected.

The Hall Carbine:

Was It a Condemned and Worthless Arm?

Carbines and muskets made according to Hall's patents
had had a long and honorable record as a standard service
arm of the United States army. The manufacture of this
type had been given up in 1852, and the batch of 5,000
Hall carbines that Ripley sold and Fremont bought were
among the last turned out. n8 The Government had ordered,
inspected, and accepted them, each carbine bearing the
inspector's stamp of approval. 117 They were the best Hall
carbines that had ever been made, being distinguished from
earlier examples by cast steel instead of iron barrels and
by a side-lever that facilitated loading known as North's
improvement. When Kipley sold them they were still in
new condition, never having been removed from their origi-
nal packing boxes except for oiling and cleaning. Every
witness who had handled the arms testified that they were
new: no witness disputed their testimony. 218

While in command of the Western Department, Fre-
mont in his extremity distributed to his troops certain
lots of unfamiliar Continental muskets that his men found
unacceptable. Accounts of their protests, bordering on
mutiny, still survive." 9 About one batch of Austrian mus-
kets the men said they would much rather be in front of
the guns than behind them. By contrast, not a word is
to be found in the records to indicate that the Hall carbines
caused serious dissatisfaction, and in fact they appear to
have been welcomed and to have given valuable service.
Fremont himself said that he had "heard no complaint"
about them, and on another occasion he testified that "it
proved to be a good arm". 130 It is inconceivable that
Ripley's friends and Fremont's enemies would have failed
to exploit criticisms, if there had been any. Undoubtedly
the men would have preferred other models that were
superseding Hall's guns, such as Sharps' or Burnside's;
but the Hall carbines were a serviceable, well-made arm.
An analogy is to be found in World War I experience: the

55

56 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

Enfield was the favored rifle for British troops, but in the
dearth of arms that prevailed during the early phases of
the war, Krag-Jorgensens emerged from obsolescence and
gave valued service.

The enemies of Fremont in the polemic of 1861-2 de-
scribed the Hall carbines that he had bought from Stevens
as condemned and worthless arms. A brief account of the
remarkable place won by Hall's guns in the history of
American firearms 121 will show how exaggerated and mis-
leading, and even perhaps wholly untrue, these aspersions
were.

Four epoch-making developments took place in the
evolution of small-arms during the nineteenth century:
(i) rifled barrels completely replaced smoothbores; (2)
ignition by percussion supplanted flintlocks; (3) the ma-
chinist's art reached such precision that gun parts could
be made interchangeable; and (4) breech-loaders super-
seded muzzle-loaders. In all four of these fields John H.
Hall's arms were pioneers. His first substantial order from
the Government, in 1819, called for rifled barrels, 5 * 3 though
rifling was not to become universal until the second half
of the century. He seems to have turned out percussion
guns in the remarkably early year of 1833, almost a decade
before percussion became universally adopted. 158 He was
the first to manufacture guns with replaceable parts in a
Government arsenal. m And his arms were the first breech-
loaders to be adopted as a service arm by any country.
His breech-loading patent was the characteristic feature of
his arms.

Judged by modern ideas, Hall's solution of the breech-
loading problem was peculiar. To avoid loading" by the
muzzle with a ram-rod, he hit on the plan of making a
joint in the barrel immediately in front of the seat of the
bullet. In later breech-loaders, of course, the charge has
been inserted from behind; and the invention of the con-
venient metallic cartridge with a rim has made this easy.
But in the days when powder and ball came in paper car-
tridges, or were even inserted separately, the problem of
securely lodging the charge in the breech in any way

w

s

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o c o rt

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Q a-^ 8

c o
<*

^^OJ
^

WHAT WAS A HALL CARBINE? 57

except by ramming it home from in front defied the ingenu-
ity of inventors. Hall's radical solution proved in the end
a blind alley in the evolution of breech-loaders, but for a
time it enjoyed much vogue. Even Major Hagner, in 1861,
severe critic though he was, expressed a liking for the
Hall method of loading, whereby the charge could be thrust
securely into place with the thumb or finger from in front
of its seat. 125

But the joint in the barrel was the source of trouble.
It allowed an escape of gas that diminished the force of
the bullet and therefore its range and penetrating power.
The escape of gas with the flash incommoded the soldier;
and after the shooting of some rounds, it was likely to foul
the joint with burnt power. Occasionally it would split
the wooden stock of the gun, necessitating repairs. 356

There was a second weakness. While the breech was
open and the soldier was loading it, he could, under certain
circumstances, shoot his own finger or thumb. This could
happen, however, only if three conditions were met. First,
he must have placed the priming cap on the nipple. Second,
he must have cocked the gun. Third, he must have pulled
the trigger while still engaged in the loading operation.
No soldier in his senses would do these things. Neverthe-
less, according to the Ordnance Commission, this accident
had occasionally happened, and it had operated as an
inducement in the 'so's to superannuate the arm. 127 The
accident must have been rare indeed, as it could occur only
deliberately, or else to an untrained or careless or drunken
or disobedient soldier. Numerous reports of ordnance
officials on HalFs arms made at intervals over several
decades are easily accessible, and they fail to mention this
disability. Apart from the unsupported statement of the
Ordnance Commission, who were speaking of occasional
accidents throughout the entire life of the Hall model,
nothing has been found to indicate that the accident had
ever occurred; and neither the Commission nor any other
contemporary commentator alleged that it happened to any
Union soldiers in the Civil War. In its hazards to the
user, the Hall model could be compared to a pistol or

58 THE HALL CAKBINE AFFAIR

revolver, which also call for special care in handling. (The
break "between breech-block and barrel that is a distinguish-
ing feature of the Hall model has survived to this day in
the revolver.) This weakness of the Hall arm would natu-
rally be a consideration in superseding it by later types of
fool-proof breech-loaders.

The history of Hall's arms is filled with tributes to it by
ordnance authorities. 328 John H. Hall took out the original
patent for his breech-loader in 1811. By perseverance, he
persuaded the conservative officials of the army to interest
themselves in it: at first they ordered a few samples, and
then a hundred guns, and finally, in 1819, a thousand stands
of rifles. In 1824 they duplicated this order. The twenty
years that followed were the heyday of the Hall carbine
and musket. They enjoyed the highest esteem, and were
manufactured in quantity. According to some writers, they
played a useful role in the Seminole and Black Hawk wars,
and perhaps in the war with Mexico. 128 All this while they
were undergoing continuous technical improvement. Hall
himself was made a captain of ordnance, and at the arsenal
of Harper's Ferry he applied himself to the manufacture of
his patented guns. As he could not cope with the Army's
demands, substantial orders were also placed with a private
contractor, Simeon North, the celebrated gunsmith of
Middletown, Conn., whose plant turned out Hall's carbines
steadily from 1828 to 1852.

The prestige of Hall's arms in these years of their great-
est vogue is seen in the following excerpt 130 from a report
on recent trials sent to the Secretary of War by George
Bomford, Colonel of Ordnance, on January 31, 1827:

This report, made by experienced officers, after a constant prac-
tice with the arms for five months, exhibits a very full view of the
subject, and clearly demonstrates the great superiority of these arms
over all others heretofore used in the public service.

The convenience, safety, and celerity with which these are loaded
and fired, and the accuracy and effect of their fire, and the durability
of the arms, have been most effectually tested, and have proved not
inferior in any of these respects to the common arms, but generally
superior in all of them, and particularly so in all that relates to
celerity and effect.

WHAT WAS A HALL CARBINE? 59

Two thousand stands have been nearly completed, and the recent
trials at Fortress Monroe, which were designed to test them in the
severest manner, has conclusively established their superiority. . .

Again, on February 8, 1836, in a formal investigation^
Colonel Bomford confirmed his earlier findings:

Captain HalFs invention has been thoroughly tested at the two
principal posts of artillery and infantry, viz.: Fort Monroe and Jef-
ferson Barracks, by long and severe service in the hands of several
companies of artillery and infantry, and by private individuals.
Many of his arms have also been applied for by and issued to the
states; and the Ordnance Department has received, from time to time,,
formal reports from boards of officers, and from individual officers to
whom the subject has been submitted, and in all the trials and com-
parisons with other firearms to which it has been submitted, whether
by private or official persons, it has invariably maintained its de-
cided superiority over all other firearms; and in short, there is no
longer any doubt of its being the best small firearm now known.

However, after Captain Hall's death, in the early '40*3,
the popularity of his arms slowly waned. Even though
Colonel North introduced the important improvement
known by his name and from 1848 on built his barrels of
steel instead of iron, it became increasingly clear that the
future of small arms lay with other models. After North's
death, manufacture ceased in 1852. Nevertheless, through-
out the *4o's and '50'$ HalFs carbines continued to have
stanch defenders. Early in 1845, when already the tide was
turning, the Lieutenant Colonel of Ordnance, G. Talcott,
felt so strongly on the subject that he wrote thus to the
Secretary of War: 132

... I am practically acquainted with the use of Hall's' arms, and
assert unqualifiedly that if my honor and life were at stake, and
depended on the use of firearms, I would sooner take one of these
carbines than any other weapon. But fashions change, and what is
good today will be cried down tomorrow. . . .

Jenks' patent arms have been more than once objected to by
competent boards of officers. Hall's arms never.

It is worth recalling that the arms commended by Bomford
and Talcott were inferior in some respects to the improved
carbines that Fremont bought from Stevens.

Evidence of the esteem in which the Hall arm was held
even as late as the ensuing decade is to be found in Com-

60 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

modore M. C. Perry's official narrative of his famous mis-
sion to Japan, 1852-54. He enumerates some of the presents
that he took with him to bestow upon the Emperor and the
exalted members of the imperial household, and in that list
we find fifteen Hall rifles, five reserved for the Emperor
himself. 133

This brings us to the alleged "condemnation" of Hall's
carbines. The earliest authority for the statement that
General Eipley was selling condemned arms to Eastman
is General Ripley himself. In his letter 134 to the Ordnance
Commission of April 17, 1862, he informed them that on
November 5, 1857 (mark the date!) the then Chief of
Ordnance, Colonel H. K. Craig, had submitted a list of
ordnance stores to the Secretary of War with a recom-
mendation that they all be sold, except muskets altered
from flintlock to percussion. "This list", wrote Ripley,
"embraced all the Hall's arms then belonging to the United
States." Unfortunately, it is impossible to confirm Ripley's
assertion. He accompanied his letter to the Ordnance Com-
mission with supporting documentation, but it is a singular
fact that he withheld the one document essential for his
defense the condemnation order naming the Hall carbines.
This is doubly curious because General Fremont, in testify-
ing before a Congressional committee, had already, on the
previous January 17, expressed doubt whether the guns had
really been condemned: 135

With respect to the sale of these arms by the Government [declared
Fremont], I have nothing to say. They were new, and I am told
were sold without being 1 condemned.

Our diligent efforts to uncover a copy of the list of arms
ordered sold on November 5, 1857, have been unsuccessful.
November 5, 1857! It is a pity that Fremont's friends
did not seize upon that date. Only a year before the Hall
carbine affair was aired, the North was being stirred to
violent indignation by reason of that self-same order for
the sale of arms. The circumstances were such as to
deprive the act of "condemnation" of meaning, and if the

WHAT WAS A HALL CARBINE? 6 1

Hall carbines were on the list, which is uncertain, this was
not necessarily a serious reflection on their quality.

John B. Floyd, a Virginian, was President Buchanan's
Secretary of War in 1857. In the summer of that year he
ordered the Chief of Ordnance to assemble a list of such
ordnance stores as were "damaged or otherwise unsuit-
able for the public service", with a view to their sale. Over
the protests of the Chief of Ordnance, Floyd insisted that
a large quantity of muskets altered from flintlock to per-
cussion should be included in the list. Though obsolescent,
they were still serviceable. On November 5, 1857, Craig,
again protesting against the inclusion of the altered mus-
kets, submitted the list to Floyd pursuant to his orders.
Two years later Floyd sold almost 40,000 of these altered
muskets, and then shipped others from northern to south-
ern arsenals on the eve of the Civil War. His action let
loose a storm of indignation in the North, where it was
widely held that the Secretary of War had unlawfully
authorized the sale of serviceable arms and had deliberately
denuded the North of useful guns as he saw the approach
of trouble. There was, of course, a Congressional investi-
gation. 238

In none of the documents relating to the list of Novem-
ber 5, 1857, is there any mention of the Hall carbines, or
any catch-all reference to miscellaneous arms that might
embrace them. Let us assume, however, that they were
on the list. If Floyd was the traitor that Northern ex-
tremists believed, his order to dispose of ordnance stores
is suspect throughout. If he was acting in good faith, as
perhaps most students now believe, his own explanation
for his behavior in 1857 clears the air equally well. In
that year sensible men were not yet expecting civil war.
The small-arms market was in a ferment with technical
improvements that were revolutionizing the industry. A new
model of muzzle-loading Springfield gun with rifled barrel
was sweeping all earlier types of service-arm into obsoles-
cence. Though no satisfactory breech-loader had yet ap-
peared, inventors were besieging the ordnance authorities

62 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

with an endless variety of experimental types, and the
authorities were alive to the possibilities of the new pat-
ents. Under these conditions it was not unnatural for Sec-
retary Floyd to decide to dispose of large stocks of obso-
lescent arms that he felt would never be used. Thus when
Craig-, the Chief of Ordnance, advised his chief not to sell
the altered flintlocks on the ground that they could "be
made serviceable on an emergency", and would bring too
low a price, Floyd replied that with the passage of time,
"as the clumsy arm becomes more and more antiquated",
the price would fall even lower. Unless he was deep-dyed in
villainy, this proves how little he foresaw the Civil War,
and why he was in haste to sell arms that were passing
out of fashion.

The Secretary of War derived his authority to sell ord-
nance stores from an act approved on March 3, 1825. The
committee of Congress that investigated Floyd's conduct,
early in 1861, considered that only by taking "a very liberal
construction of the law" could his sales of altered muskets,
which were serviceable though old-fashioned, be construed
as within its provisions. This would be equally true of
Hall's carbines. Kipley himself recognized that when un-
damaged they were "serviceable". He admitted in 1862 that
the Army regulations required an offer at public auction of
"condemned stores" before they could be sold privately;
and also he admitted with evident reluctance that the car-
bines sold to Eastman had not been previously offered at
auction. 137 Ripley told the House investigating committee
that "the Hall's arms had been tried in service and been
reported unfit for use as a military weapon. . . . The
condemnation for use in service was on account of the prin-
ciple of the arms, and applied to new as much as to dam-
aged arms." 138 Yet under date of August 10 (within a few
days of the Stevens-Fremont transaction) the Array pub-
lished a revised edition of its regulations, and in the section
devoted to small arms, Hall's carbine appears duly listed
among the others, at a price of $17.00. If this model had
been definitely condemned and abandoned, the Ordnance
Bureau was curiously lax in the editing of the new regula-

WHAT WAS A HALL CARBINE? 63

tions. Fremont's friends made much of this point, 128 and
Ripley never offered an explanation. Ripley's criticisms of
the arm were uttered when he was defending himself, and
were taken up and repeated by enemies of Fremont's, and
by those who were seeking a justification for withholding
payment from Stevens.

The facts about the Hall carbines are abundantly clear.
Whether in 1857 there was a willingness in ordinance circles
to sell them may never be known, and under the circum-
stances attending the Craig order this is immaterial. They
were an obsolescent arm, but serviceable in a time of need.
If civil war had not broken out, the army would never have
made use of them, and the price of $3.50 at which Ripley
sold them might have been reasonable. But the crisis in the
arms market in 1861 caught the Hall carbine at that par-
ticular stage of obsolescence where its usefulness could be
easily revived, and thereby its value enjoyed a phenomenal
rise.

When Fremont agreed to pay $22 for new, rifled Hall
carbines with cast steel barrels, Ripley's own Bureau was
paying the extraordinary price of $35 for Sharps' carbines,
$32.50 for Smith's, and $35 for Burnside's. 1 * Fremont testi-
fied that the arms were worth to him what he had paid for
them. 1 * 1 Major Hagner in October 1861 testified that in his
judgement the Hall carbine early in August had been worth
between $10 and $12. His appraisal sets a minimum worth,
for he had no use for Stevens and by his own story he was
a conservative bidder who was always losing out to com-
petitors in the soaring market of those days. As for Ripley,
his testimony against the Hall guns was self-serving. If
his examiners had driven home their questions, he could
have been embarrassed, for the records of his own Bureau
disclose a startling fact. In that same month of August
" 1 86 1, and while some of the carbines sold to Eastman were
still lying on Governor's Island, Ripley's Ordnance Bureau
was buying second-hand Hall guns by the hundreds, paying
$9 each for one batch and $15 for another! We know noth-
ing about the condition of these second-hand arms, except

64 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

that they must have been inferior to the 5,000 carbines that
Ripley had sold. 113

In short, however shocking the double profit that East-
man and Stevens made, it is hard to disagree with the find-
ing of the Court of Claims that the arms in August 1861
could be reasonably valued at $22.

Perhaps no one living today knows more about the Hall
model than Claud E. Fuller, author of The Breechloader in
the Service. In response to an inquiry about the alleged
condemnation of the Hall arm and its defects, Mr. Fuller
in a personal letter to the writer dated April 27, 1937, wrote
as follows :

I remember reading of the Fremont transaction but do not recall
seeing list of November 5, 1857, and could never understand why
the Hall carbines were condemned since it appears very certain that
a large number of Hall Flintlock rifles were at Harper's Ferry
being converted to percussion just prior to the war and it is a part
of these arms that were taken by the Confederates and made into the
so-called Confederate Hall.

No reports that I have seen went into any great details in ref-
ence to the escape of gas and the splitting of the stocks and in a
great many of these arms I have examined I have never seen any
stocks that appeared to have been injured at firing though many of
them did give evidence of excessive leakage and burning at the joints.

As I recall it the old manuals provided for the loading of the
piece before the cap was applied so that it would seem that the
accidental discharge of the gun could only result from the grossest
carelessness and disobedience in following the established procedure
of loading.

Simon Stevens:

A Possible Solution to an Enigma

One question remains: who was Simon Stevens? How
did it come about that Morgan lent him money ? Why was
Ketchum, on security that no cautious banker would ordi-
narily accept, so generous in his advances ? Why did East-
man, when asked whom he had sold his arms to, reply that
"Mr. Simon Stevens, of this City, was the chief negotia-
tor"? 1 ** Why did Ketchum testify that he supposed there
were other persons associated with Stevens, apart from
Eastman and Hubbard? 1 " When the House Investigating
Committee asked Stevens whether anyone was interested
with him in the contract, why did he content himself with
denying that anyone connected with the Government had
an interest and with defining the limited scope of Morgan's
interest, averring as to the rest that the whole matter was
conducted in his name, that it was a private matter of
which he did not feel at liberty to speak, "or to give the
names of those interested"? 1 * 5 Why did not the investi-
gators clear up these points by pushing their inquiries
home?

As happens in a soundly constructed detective story,
those who skip lightly through the record of the Hall car-
bine affair may be tempted to point the finger of suspicion
toward that mute figure in a secondary role, the only par-
ticipant in the story well known to later generations, J.
Pierpont Morgan. But, as we have seen, a perusal of the
whole record defines with finality, over and over again,
his limited role. As we shall now see, the plot yields other
clues, hot ones, to explain Simon Stevens's mysterious as-
sociates in the business, and to account for his contact with
Morgan. Though the explanations remain conjectural, they
are inherently consistent and convincing.

Contemporary commentators left Stevens a shadowy
figure ; only once or twice were his connections mentioned.
Yet his past had a vital bearing on the role that he played
in the carbine transaction.

65

66 THE HALL CARBINE APFAIE

Stevens was born on September 22, 1825, In Barnet, Vt.
His father, old Hemy Stevens, was a farmer and anti-
quarian, a well-known man throughout Vermont in his
time, a collector and dealer in old books and manuscripts
and an authority on Vermont history. 1 * 6 Simon, one of
eleven children, prepared for Yale, but instead of going
to college, he moved to Lancaster, Pa., and there read law
in the offices of Thaddeus Stevens, the intransigent abo-
litionist. Though bearing the same surname, Simon was
in no way, even in the most remote degree, any kinsman
of ThaddeusV 47 Simon was admitted to the Pennsylvania
bar about 1844, and after practicing law in Lancaster for
some time, he went to "Washington, apparently as Thad-
deus Stevens's political secretary. He was admitted to
practice law before the Supreme Court, and he married a
Mrs. Chubb, the widow of a Washington banker. He said
afterwards that he met Fremont in 1855* doubtless in con-
nection with the early organization of the Republican party.

Late in 1860 or early 1861, after the election of Lin-
coln but before his inauguration, Stevens, then 35 years
old, removed to New York, where Republican appointees
were taking over federal posts and where the municipal
administration was also shortly to fall into the hands of
the lusty young party. A henchman of powerful leaders in
the Republican party, Simon's connections landed him a job.

In the early J 6o's it was the practice for samples of
foreign goods entering the port of New York to be carted
for customs* examination from the wharves to appraisers'
stores, as they were called. Before 1859 the carting, un-
packing, repacking, and handling had been done directly
by the Government, But there had been much criticism of
the Government's wasteful employment of labor in this
work, and as a result the Buchanan administration had
fanned out the work, as a reform move, to a group of four
private contractors at a saving in cost. The waste had
previously been so considerable that they still had leeway
for profits. They were Democrats, and their contract was
to run for three years, until September 5, 1862. When the
Republicans took office, the Democratic contractors, appar-

SIMON STEVENS: AN ENIGMA 67

ently afraid that the new Administration would find a way
to squeeze them out, assigned their contract to Simon
Stevens and another Republican for $20,000, retaining how-
ever a silent interest in it. Stevens and his associates were
backed by unnamed parties. Stevens assumed his duties
supervising the work on May n, 1861, just a few months
before the sale of the Hall carbines to Fremont. He con-
tinued in the job, occupying an office in the Government
store at 56 Broadway, until the expiration of the contract
on September 5, 1862. No fraud against the Government in
the transactions relating to the customs house contract was
ever seriously alleged; nor any charges of bribing or cor-
ruption. Stevens and his Republican colleagues were de-
manding a share in what had been Democratic spoils ; they
crowded their way into a somewhat lucrative contract,
(Over sixteen months the total profits were about $80,000.)

Simon had a sister, Miss Sophia C. Stevens, who in 1850
as a teacher in the Hartford, Conn., Public High School had
taught young Pierpont Morgan arithmetic, history, and
grammar. He also had a brother Henry, six years his
senior, who had removed to London in the summer of 1845.
By 1 86 1 this brother had become well established in London
as the leading buying agent for American libraries and
book collectors abroad; he represented, among others, the
Smithsonian Institution. Henry Stevens was one of the
prominent members of the American colony in London ; he
and a much younger brother, Benjamin Franklin Stevens,
who arrived in London in 1860, were destined to make an
enduring place for themselves as specialists in Americana
and as bibliographers. Henry had already become a friend,
apparently a close friend, of George Peabody; and he was
well known to Junius Spencer Morgan, Peabody's partner
in the banking business and J. Pierpont Morgan's father,
then resident in London. It may well be that when the
young Morgan had visited his family in London in the
middle 'so's, he had met Henry Stevens.

Simon Stevens and young Morgan could hardly have
known each other well, for they had led their lives far
apart; although it is possible that in journeying between

68 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

his home in Vermont and Lancaster or Washington, Simon
may have stopped in the Hartford hotel owned by Morgan's
grandfather, and there met the Morgan family.

Simon Stevens had been in New York only a few months
when Eastman offered him the 5,000 Hall carbines, and he
needed some $20,000 to take up the arms. With the highest
sponsorship in the Republican party, this 36-year old politi-
cian and business man turned to the former pupil of his
sister, the 24-year old son of his brother Henry's friend.
It was a natural place to go, and it was natural for young
Morgan, with his loyalty toward friends, to make a loan,
against ample collateral, to a person of Simon's family and
connections. The two men had had no previous business
dealings together, and young Morgan looked only to the
soundness of his loan.

Before the end of August Eastman was pressing
Stevens to pay him the balance due on the arms. Far from
helping Stevens at this juncture, Morgan was himself
demanding immediate repayment of his loan. And so
Stevens turned to Ketchum. It will be recalled that more
than once Ketchum testified 1 * 8 that he had made his ad-
vances, not only on Fremont's purchase agreement, but
also on the strength of a letter of introduction. This
letter, significantly, was not from Ketchum's young friend
Morgan, but from one George Opdyke. The Eepublican
party had just come into power for the first time in a
national election. Opdyke had been active in the conven-
tion that nominated Lincoln. In the late fall of 1861 he
was to run for mayor of New York, and to be elected the
first Republican mayor of that city. Opdyke was a political
power, competing in influence in New York state with
Thurlow Weed of Albany. Simon Stevens by reason of his
customs house contract was immersed in partisan politics.
When the Hall carbine deal came his way, what could have
been more natural than for him to ally with himself
some political associates? Perhaps George Opdyke (not
yet an office holder) was one, and perhaps this explains
Opdyke's interest in bespeaking Ketchum's favor on behalf

SIMON STEVENS: AN ENIGMA 69

of Stevens. If this is what happened, it is easy to see why
a Republican investigating committee may have thought it
unwise to insist on the disclosure of Stevens's associates. 1 * 8

There are various straws of evidence lending additional
color to our surmise that Opdyke was Stevens's partner. It
is known that Opdyke at about this time was dipping into
the arms market and participating in another carbine con-
tract. Before the end of 1861 he became financially inter-
ested in Marston's arms shop, where most of Stevens's
guns were altered. Finally, he was in Washington on Janu-
ary 22, 1862, the day when Ketchum re-appeared before the
House Investigating Committee to plead his case for full
payment, and it is a tempting hypothesis that he was there
to use his influence with his Republican friends in the
same cause.

It is impossible, on the record, to condone Stevens's
conduct in the Hall carbine case, or to paint his personality
in pleasing colors. He pretended to be Fremont's friend,
but he did not hesitate to make a large profit out of the
General's needs, and was the cause of embarrassment to the
General later when the facts became public. As we have
seen, even his patron, Thaddeus Stevens, could not stomach
the carbine transaction, admitting on the floor of the Senate
that "it was a speculation which may not be very pleasant
to look at". Stevens emerges from the testimony a mediocre
figure tall (he was six feet two inches in height) , erect,
robust, energetic; but cocky, indiscreet and boastful in his
talk, tricky in business but clumsy withal, apparently a
bully toward his subordinates. He did not, however, lose
the confidence of Fremont, for in the summer of 1862 he
served as intermediary in introducing Fremont to Ketchum
and Opdyke for the re-financing of Fremont's California
gold mine, the Mariposa stake. This was a disastrous nego-
tiation for Fremont, who soon found himself deprived of
most of his interest in the property and in deeper financial
straits than before. A vivid picture of Stevens and the
world he lived in Fremont, Opdyke, Ketchum, etc.
(Morgan was not mentioned) is to be found in the record
of the famous libel suit of Opdyke V. Weed, which filled the
newspapers for weeks in the winter of 1864-5.

70 THE HALL CAEBINE AFFAIR

Apparently Stevens was a friend of Horace Greeley's
until the latter's death, breakfasting with the old editor on
Sunday mornings; and he seems to have become a friend
and supporter of James G. Elaine. May not his friendship
with Greeley have originated at the time of the Hall car-
bine disclosures, when both men were interested (though
for different reasons, one patriotic and the other to estab-
lish his contract) in vindicating the reputation of Fremont?

In 1864-6 Stevens was in partnership with his brother
Benjamin Franklin Stevens, engaging in the London-New
York book trade. A few years later we find him with the
grandiloquent title of president of the Tehuantepec Bail-
way Co., an abortive enterprise for constructing a railroad
across the Mexican isthmus. Years afterwards he re-
appears as something of an authority on New York riparian
rights, with offices at 61 Broadway, though he was never
admitted to the New York bar. He died on August 28, 1894,
and was buried in Woodlands Cemetery, Philadelphia.
# # #

So stood our information about Simon Stevens, and
those were our inferences concerning his character, when
this book went to press for its first edition in 1941.

In the summer of 1946 my brother and I visited Barnet,
the town in Vermont that old Enos Stevens, father of Harry
Stevens the antiquarian, had founded in the late i8th cen-
tury. We learned that in the earliest days the town had
even been called Stevens' Village, after its leading family.
But now there is not a soul in Barnet bearing that name,
apart from the many that lie silent in the graveyard.

However, we found in Barnet one life-long resident,
Miss Edith Harriet Wallace, a gracious lady of distinguished
mien, who welcomed us to her home, where all the furnish-
ings even to the golden wall paper, seemed to come down
from a century ago, (Her grandfather's clock was brought
over in 1785, and had ticked, she told us, several billion
times, according to careful calculation.) Now she too was
the last of her line. Her memory was peopled with the de-
parted citizens of Barnet, and her father and she had known

SIMON STEVENS: AN ENIGMA 71

the Stevens family well. Of "Frank" (Benjamin Franklin)
Stevens she spoke with special warmth, and from her we
learned that Sophia, who had come to know Nathaniel Haw-
thorne in Eome, had inspired the character of Hilda in the
Marble Faun.

Our hostess had met Simon Stevens only once, late in
his life. He had left Barnet early, she explained, and then
had ignored the town for most of his life, as though he was
too good for it; but in the end he came back for a visit
and gave a reception for old family friends in the inn, which
was called The Sheaves. (The inn burned down in 1891.)
I asked her about Simon's character. She said firmly that
he had had a very high opinion of himself, and he was doubt-
less a smart man, but (and here she apologized for saying a
cruel thing) he was a "bloat": her father had once told
her, she recalled, that Simon was the kind of man who would
eat in an ordinary restaurant and then go and pick his teeth
on the steps of the Fifth Avenue Hotel.

Epilogue

From the elaborateness of our account of the Hall car-
bine affair, one might gather that it had historical im-
portance. It had none. By a combination of circumstances,
there has survived a wealth of readily accessible documen-
tation revealing in minute detail, often from divergent
angles that invite cross-checking, almost every phase of
this obscure transaction of three-quarters of a century ago.

Fremont, battered by criticisms, lost his command of
the Western Department. But his purchase of the carbines
had nothing to do with his removal: it was exploited to
some extent, and unfairly, by men who were already his
enemies, as additional ammunition against him. The bur-
den of their charges against him lay in fundamentals, not
in small-change.

Cameron lost his post in Lincoln's cabinet because of
his mishandling of government contracts. But his author-
ization of the sale of 5,000 carbines to Eastman was such a
small matter that it did not figure in the vote of censure
passed by the House of Representatives against him on
April 30, 1862, in which only his purchases were mentioned.

Ripley, who was primarily to blame for the sale of the
carbines in a time of need, remained Chief of Ordnance for
two more years, before being eased out into a less active
post by Cameron's successor,

Ketchuni's old and important banking firm went down
in bankruptcy under tragic circumstances before the Civil
War had long been over ; but his claim against the govern-
ment played no part in that event.

Morgan's subordinate role in the episode passed virtu-
ally unnoticed at the time, and there is no reason to believe
that he ever gave it thought during the ensuing half cen-
tury in which he lived out his career. For the Hall carbine
affair lay completely forgotten in the archives of the Civil
War until about 1910, some three years before his death.

EPILOGUE 73

And so we have completed our narrative of the Hall
carbine affair. What will the moralist say about J. Pier-
pont Morgan's role in it? The marxists, their thinking
grooved to their Predetermined Plan, find the answer easy.
This rich, well-born young man facilitated a wretched
transaction. What if he was not fully informed? He per-
sonally took delivery of the arms at the Government arsenal,
and he refused to ship all the arms to Fremont until Fre-
mont's subordinate had paid Steven's exorbitant price for
the first batch. Off with his head!

But the moralist, who weighs evidence by other stand-
ards, will consider various things. Morgan did not initiate
any phase of the deal. At the age of twenty-four he was
asked to make a safe loan by a man with whom he had had
no previous dealings, a man twelve years his senior, a man
with a ready tongue, a man who could point to impressive
political connections, a man whose family background must
have served as a splendid introduction. Morgan only lent
money and took charge of the carbines while they were
being altered; he was not a partner with a split in the
profits. The evidence permits the possibility that when he
lent the money he did not know the terms of re-sale. It is
certain that shortly after he lent the money, and before the
scandal broke publicly, he was striving to liquidate his
interest In the affair, and in this after some days he was
successful. The moralist will also observe that no contem-
porary, in any of the investigations, singled out Morgan
for censure. They treated him as the minor figure that he
was. At the time of the episode there seems to have been
no occasion for Morgan to tell his side of the story, and
now we shall never hear it. The charge of evil-doing was
not leveled against him until 1910, when he was old and
tired and weighed down with cares of larger scope; and
then the charge, built upon gross factual misstatements,
appeared in a book steeped in marxist bias that drew little
attention on its appearance and that Morgan may never
have seen. If he did see it, he naturally ignored it.

These being the circumstances, the reader will deliver
judgement.

Part II
HISTORY INTO LEGEND

What Happened

The facts in the Hall carbine affair are clear. Before
pursuing their metamorphosis into legend, it will be well to
recapitulate them.

Late in the spring of 1861, when the War of Secession
was just getting under way, the Chief of Ordnance of the
United States Army, James W. Ripley, agreed to sell a lot
of more than 5,000 smoothbore guns to one Arthur M.
Eastman at $3.50 each, being all of the Hall model that the
Government owned.

Though no one questions Ripley's good faith, his sale
of the Hall arms proved a blunder. It should have been
evident to him that in the emergency no serviceable arms
could be spared. Of those that he was selling, 5,000 were
carbines in new condition, in their original packing boxes.
They had been made on Government order between 1848
and 1852 by Simeon North at Middletown, Conn. The Gov-
ernment had inspected, accepted, and paid for them. The
Hall model had enjoyed considerable vogue in the '30% but
the ensuing decades saw rapid progress in the designing of
small-arms, and it passed out of favor. General Ripley later
alleged that all Hall arms had been recommended for sale
in 1857; but the fact is that those in good condition had
not been sold, and documentary support for his allegation
has not been found. Furthermore, in 1857, when sensible
persons were still not expecting war, the Secretary of War
had favored the sale of even serviceable arms of all older
models to make room in the arsenals for the new guns that
were superseding all others. There is no convincing evi-
dence that any responsible army authority had ever con-
demned the Hall carbines as unserviceable. At most the
authorities may have thought in 1857 that there would
never be a call for the Hall carbines, and that therefore
they should be sold. These guns were a well built, service-
able weapon, and when war threatened, it was madness to
sell them at any price.

Eastman had no money to carry out his contract He
tried to re-sell the guns to others, but with no success until

77

78 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

after the rout of the Union forces at Bull Run, late in July,
when a stampede began for arms of every description. He
then encountered a man named Simon Stevens, who agreed
to pay him $12.50 for 5,000 rifled Hall carbines in new
condition. Later the price was cut to $11.50, the rifling to
be left to Stevens. Payment was to be in two instalments,
$20,000 within a few days, and the balance of $37?5oo a
few weeks later. Eastman hid from Stevens the fact that
the arms were still held by the Government.

Stevens at once re-offered the arms by telegraph to his
friend General John C. Fremont at $22.00 apiece. Fremont
was in command of the Western Department with head-
quarters at St. Louis, and he accepted instantly, for Ms
troops wanted guns badly. At that time Stevens did not tell
Eastman of the sale to Fremont.

Stevens now needed $20,000 for the initial payment to
Eastman, and he sought a loan of that amount from a
young man in New York, J. Pierpont Morgan, who had
only recently started in business for himself.

Morgan lent $20,000 to Stevens on August 7, He took
the arms as collateral : by the most conservative valuation,
they were worth two or three times the amount of his ad-
vance. He stipulated that when Stevens sold them, the
bills should be made out in his favor, so that he would be
reimbursed out of the first proceeds. He advanced certain
additional sums to pay for the rifling of the carbines and
Incidental expenses. On September 14, 1861, thirty-eight
days after he made his loan, payment for the first half of
the arms reached him. He deducted $26,343.54. in liquida-
tion of his loans, including interest and commission, and he
never had any further interest in the Hall carbine affair.
In due course all the carbines reached Fremont's troops;
they appear to have given good service and caused no seri-
ous complaints.

Early in the fall of 1861 the shocking circumstances of
the Hall carbine transaction became known, how one
branch of the Government had sold for $3.50 smoothbores
that another branch had bought, after rifling, for $22.00.
The Government at once held up payment for the second

RECAPITULATION 79

half of the arms, and there was a general hue and cry. A
Congressional committee held hearings and submitted ten-
tative findings. The War Department took testimony,
assembled documents, and made recommendations. Gen-
eral Ripley submitted certain information to Congress in a
special report. General Fremont was questioned by the
famous Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War- There
was a debate on the Hall carbine affair in the House of
Representatives, and scattered comment appeared in the
press.

Stevens persisted in his claim for his final payment, sup-
ported by a financial backer named Morris Ketchum. Ulti-
mately Stevens brought suit in the Court of Claims,
Ketchum however having the chief interest in the claim.
In defending the case, the Government invoked a legal
technicality, the United States Solicitor contending that
under an old law Fremont had no authority to buy arms
except through regular ordnance channels. He also con-
tended that $22.00 was an unreasonable price for the car-
bines in August 1 86 1. The Court of Claims made short
work of the defense. Brushing aside the technicality, it
held that a general commanding an army in the field would
expose himself to something worse than censure, if he failed
to equip his troops as best he could to meet the enemy. On
the strength of substantial evidence, it held that the price,
in view of the conditions in the arms market at the time,
had been reasonable* The Government had a weak case to
start with, and it did not carry the case to the higher court.

It must be rare in history that an episode so unimpor-
tant as the Hall carbine affair is so thoroughly docu-
mented. The various hearings and reports and depositions
make possible an accurate cross-check of almost every phase
of the transaction. In the person of Ripley the Govern-
ment displayed that lack of business sense which often
afflicts democracies, and Eastman the speculator stood at
his elbow to profit thereby. Stevens, another speculator,
exploited his friendship with Fremont and the latter's needs
to make another large profit. At the same time, in f airness
to Stevens, it should be borne in mind that no fraud tainted

80 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

his transaction. Fremont knew exactly what he was buy-
ing, and he received exactly what he ordered.

As for Morgan, he had no part in initiating the pur-
chase from the government or the sale to the government.
In. thirty-eight days his loan was paid off. He was never
called to testify, much less did he ever push a claim he had
none to push and no one ever disputed his right to reim-
bursement. In the contemporary discussion of the case,
the press ignored his minor role ; neither the House Investi-
gating Committee nor the War Department in their reports
singled him out for criticism ; in the Congressional debate
Ms name was mentioned only once, and then only to em-
phasize his circumscribed interest.

When young Morgan made his $20,000 loan to Stevens
on August 7, 1861, he knew that the proceeds were going
for the purchase of arms from the Federal government.
He was in a position to satisfy himself that the sale of the
arms by the Government had been approved by the Chief
of Ordnance and the Secretary of War. On the other hand,
though the documentation concerning the whole affair is
extraordinarily complete, there is an absence of evidence to
show that Morgan knew, when he made his loan, of
Stevens's re-sale of the arms to Fremont. There is circum-
stantial evidence to support the supposition that he was
not privy to the Fremont contract. Before the month of
August was out f and weeks before the public scandal broke,
Stevens was in acute need of more money to pay off the
balance that he owed to Eastman, but Morgan, far from
accommodating him further, was himself demanding imme-
diate repayment of the loan he had already made. Stevens
got relief finally from Ketchum, a friend of Morgan's ; how-
ever, Stevens met Ketchum, not through Morgan's good
offices, but through another man's. Clearly Morgan's rela-
tions with Stevens became strained, for some reason, soon
after he made his loan.

At the time of the Hall carbine transaction, Morgan, then
24 years old, had had no previous dealings with Stevens;
if they had known each other at all, the acquaintanceship
was slight. There were reasons, however* why Morgan

EECAPITULATION 8 1

should be predisposed favorably toward the applicant.
Stevens, by twelve years Morgan's senior, was highly con-
nected in the Republican party, being a protege of the power-
ful Thaddeus Stevens and in good relations with the two
Republican leaders in New York City, Hiram Barney and
George Opdyke, Fully as persuasive was his family back-
ground. Simon's father was a leading citizen of Vermont,
of excellent reputation. His sister Sophia had been young
Pierpont's school teacher in the Hartford, Conn., high
school. His brother Henry was one of the foremost mem-
bers of the American colony in London, where he held the
important post of U. S. Dispatch agent and represented
the Smithsonian Institution. Henry was a friend of George
Peabody's, and of Peabody's partner, the father of Pier-
pent, Junius Spencer Morgan. Young Pierpont may well
have met Henry in London.

A Legend Is Born

For almost fifty years the Hall carbine affair slumbered
in the official archives, forgotten of everyone. J. Pierpont
Morgan lived out Ms career and was approaching the end
of his days when, in 1910, a socialist named Gustavus
Myers brought out the third volume of his History of the
Great American Fortunes. In the section devoted to Mor-
gan he resuscitated the Hall carbine episode.

Myers has related his difficulties in finding a publisher
for his work, and on its appearance many critics were cool
to it. But as the decades rolled on it gained readers and
admirers, and the publication of a new edition in 1936 by
the Random House, Inc., was the occasion for a flurry of
critical acclaim. John Chamberlain had already called it a
"masterpiece of digging in the archives" ; elsewhere he had
spoken of Myers's "almost religious respect for facts", and
again ; "Mr. Myers works from documents, spending patient
minutes, hours, and even years in burrowing through the
records." 1 * Henry P. Pringle had said that Myers's work
was "far too little appreciated/' 1 * 1 Ralph Thompson now
added his tribute: "Mr. Myers had not guessed at his facts
or his interpretation; he had gone, wherever possible, to
sources : State papers, testimony before legislative commit-
tees, court reports. He had set down the story as he found
it, not interested in making it either Vivid' or 'sensa-
tionalV* 1 Ben Ray Redman, another veteran critic, was
unstinted in his praise: "In an era of shrill journalism and
often indiscriminate muckraking, Gustavus Myers distin-
guished himself as a historian who was painstaking in his
findings, sober in his judgments, and uncompromising in
his verdicts . . . there is no quarreling with the accuracy
of his history and it is as a historian that he has proved
himself almost uniquely valuable." 188 His publishers enter-
tain no doubts about the solidity of his workmanship : m

For more than a quarter of a century, Gustavus Myers' History
of the Great American Fortunes has stood unassailed as a documeni
that has recorded and made national history. ... No one has yet
challenged a single fact in Mr. Myers' work. Every statement 1

A LEGEND IS BORN 83

made with the authority of corroborated and proven evidence. At no
time did he indulge in tirades against personal traits, dispositions or
temperaments ....

Such glowing* endorsements are enough to launch any
legend on a long career ; and to defy the consensus of criti-
cal judgments may seem a rash thing, like the child's ex-
clamation about the Emperor's New Clothes. Our interest
in Myers and his work is confined to the seven or eight
pages that Myers devotes to the Hall carbine affair. (For
his text, see Appendix I, pp. 155-162.)

In retelling this episode Myers was engaged in a piece
of pioneer research. There was no likelihood that any critic
would have the specialized knowledge needed to test his
assertions; it was safe well, almost safe to assume that
no one would ever take the trouble to run down the sources.
Obviously, therefore, his duty to his readers was all the
greater to digest the entire record of the case, and to pre-
sent it impartially, even though the results might not con-
firm his thesis about the iniquity of successful men. Instead
he overlooked most of the record and chose from the rest
what suited his purpose.

There are five sources of primary material for the Hall
carbine affair. By "primary material" we mean the testi-
mony of participants and transcripts of the original docu-
ments. Most important are the depositions of witnesses and
the exhibits in the lawsuit of Stevens v. United States, on
which the decision of the Court of Claims was based.
Though the record in this case is available only in the files
of the Court, it is hard to see how any research worker
would risk writing an account of the episode without tap-
ping this material. Yet Myers shows no evidence of having
consulted it. Almost equally important are the documents
and testimony on which the special commission of the War
Department based their report, which were published in
full as a public document. Myers does not cite them. Also
indispensable is the sworn testimony of the participants in
the transaction before the House Investigating Committee;
Myers uses the volumes in which this testimony appears,
but strangely ignores the testimony itself. Apparently he

84 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

was unfamiliar with the testimony of Fremont and one of
his aides before the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the
War. Nor does he use the documents relating to arms pur-
chases submitted to Congress by General Kipley. In short,
Myers cites none of the primary material, and his account
of the episode in almost every sentence flouts the original
records.

Of "secondary material" contemporary appraisals of
the primary evidence Myers uses the decision of the Court
of Claims ; to what purpose will be shown shortly. He leans
heavily on the report of the War Department commission,
though in quoting from it he confuses it with the report of
the House Investigating Committee, He makes no use of the
House Committee's interim report, nor of the debates in
Congress, nor, with one possible exception, of contemporary
press comment. Anyone dealing with the Hall carbine
affair might be expected to inquire into the history of the
Hall arm and its distinguishing features; Myers gives no
indication of such knowledge.

Now for the Myers narrative. In the original episode
Morgan was a mute and minor character. Over and over
again the records define his circumscribed role : he made a
loan, was repaid in thirty-eight days in the normal course
of business, and was out. The Hall carbines that he took
as collateral were in new condition; the Government
blundered in selling them, and they gave good service to
Fremont. Myers, like a dramatist who re-works an old
script, pulls Morgan to the front of the stage into the
juvenile lead role; and to point up the plot, he converts the
carbines into old, worthless, and dangerous arms.

The records are clear that Morgan, Stevens, and East-
man were dealing with each other at arm's length. But
Myers invents the possibility that Eastman "had been
thrust forward to act as a dummy for a principal in the
background", presumably Stevens and Morgan, He goes on
to say that, when the Government "refused to pay Morgan
the $22 demanded for each of the five thousand carbines,"
Morgan "pressed his claim," and "thus it was that the case
of J. Pierpont Morgan vs. the United States Government

A LEGEND IS BORN 85

came into the public records." Morgan never "pressed"
any claim, and the "case" of Morgan vs. the United States
is a Myers invention. The bills for the carbines were made
out in Morgan's name as security for his loan, and when
he was paid off in thirty-eight days his connection with the
transaction was finished. Yet from these bills Myers weaves
a "claim" and a mythical lawsuit. He paraphrases the
report of the War Department commission as saying that
"even at this price [$13.31 per carbine] Morgan and
Stevens stood to make $49,000 above the price at which the
rifles had been sold to them by the United States." This is
a garbling of the Commission's statement. Neither Stevens
nor Morgan was mentioned in this connection; the Com-
mission nowhere alleged that Morgan had bought arms
from the United States, and in fact he had not done so;
nor had Stevens ; and Morgan was not looking for a penny
from the award of the Commission, since his loan had been
repaid almost nine months before, thirty-eight days after it
was made. Myers asserts that a payment on account was
made to Morgan pursuant to the Commission's findings; no
such payment was made to him or anyone else. Myers goes
on to say: "Did Morgan and his associates get their full
demands from the Government? They did." Morgan had
made no demand on the Government, and he had no
associates.

General Ripley, who was under fire for having sold the
carbines, testified that they had been condemned in 1857
with a recommendation for sale. It is a moot point whether
they had been condemned, and if so, why; Fremont doubted
it. But not Myers, who accepts without question Ripley's
assertions, which he paraphrases thus: "In 1857 the army
inspecting officers condemned a large number of HalFs car-
bines as thoroughly unserviceable, and as of obsolete and
dangerous pattern." He states that a Congressional com-
mittee, inquiring into the case, "reported that the rifles
were so bad that it was found that they would shoot off
the thumbs of the very soldiers using them." There is no
reason to believe that any soldier in the Civil War shot
himself in this way, and no Congressional committee made

86 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

any such report. The War Department commission, dis-
cussing experience with Hall arms in earlier decades,
pointed out that occasionally soldiers had wounded them-
selves with them; no confirmation of this assertion has
been found, and the mechanism of the arm is such that the
wound could hardly be inflicted except deliberately.

Criticising the Court of Claims for rendering judgement
on behalf of Stevens, Myers says that it "took no cognizance
of the fact that the worthless, condemned rifles had been
represented as new." Note this example of the Myers
method. The Court took full cognizance of the evidence
bearing on the condition and value of the arms, and came
to this conclusion, which Myers fails to quote:

This record abounds in evidence showing that the carbines were of
good quality, that twenty-two dollars each was a fair market price for
them, and that there was a great demand for and a great scarcity of

fire-arms in the market

The reader of Myers would conclude that Fremont had been
deceived as to the merchandise he was buying or the price
he was paying; but Fr&nont was correctly informed in
every respect.

Summarizing the Court's decision, Myers says:

Peck held that when Fremont had agreed to buy the rifles
he had entered into a contract which bound the Government, and that
a contract was a contract.

Nowhere did the judge hold that "a contract is a contract/'
or anything of the kind, but let the reader bear this phrase
in mind for it will recur, Myers's statement gives the reader
no inkling of the legal question that the Court faced:
whether a commanding general in the field facing an enemy
was obliged to seek supplies through regular channels, or
whether he could dispense with red tape in an emergency
and buy in the open market. The Court gave the only
sensible answer.

If Morgan pushed a claim against the Government, as
Myers alleges, why does not Myers produce from the com-
plete official files the document signed by Morgan or Ms

A LEGEND IS BOEN 87

attorney constituting the claim? Or at least some reference
to such a document? Why does he not point to any act or
word of Morgan's, in the whole course of the Hall carbine
affair, indicating that he looked beyond his collateral and
his debtor Stevens to the government for financial satis-
faction?

Why does not Myers quote a single sentence censuring
Morgan in this transaction from Court, judge, attorney,
War Department, General, Investigating Committee, Rep-
resentative, Senator, newspaper, public man, or private
citizen of that day? If Morgan was such a villain, why
did nobody discover it at the time? Why was this plenary
Revelation reserved for Myers fifty years later? Is it in
fact Apocalypse or Apocrypha? That saying of Henry
Ford's, "History is bunk/' would truly describe "history"
of the type of the Hall Carbine Legend, for it would
fall under the head of what the Catechism forbids as "evil-
speaking, lying, and slandering."

In his conclusion Myers says of the Court of Claims
decision :

It was this particular decision which assured the open sesame for
the holders of what were then cynically called "deadhorse claims" to
collect the full amount of their swindling operations. The Govern-
ment could now plead itself defenseless against the horde of contrac-
tors who had bribed officials to accept decayed ships and defective
armor, worthless arms and shoddy clothing, flimsy tents, blankets and
shoes, and haversacks which came to pieces, adulterated food and
similar equipment and supplies.

Is this passage merely a florid elaboration of the following
sentence (already cited on p. 54) in the Washington dis-
patch that appeared in The New-York Times on May 13,
1867?

This decision opens up a wide field for the owners of "deadhorse"
claims, and the contractors who furnished shoddy clothing and worth-
less arms to the Government, on the telegraphic requisition of extrav-
agant commanders, can step in and get the satisfaction which they
were denied at the War Department.

Myers appears to have appropriated the Times dispatch
uncritically. The fact is that the Stevens case had no im-

88 THE HALL CAEBINB AFFAIR

portance as a precedent. Certainly it could have had no
bearing on the claims that Myers mentions where bribery
had been used, for bribery would have introduced a differ-
ent issue.

Many of Myers's effects are achieved by subtle means
that no casual reader could be expected to catch. They
almost defy exposure, for to analyze them is to blow away
their fragrance. Here are some examples :

i. It will be recalled that one of the minor participants
in the Hall carbine transaction was a Captain Callender,
in charge of the St. Louis arsenal. Myers quotes from the
decision of the Court a passage referring to Captain Cal-
lender, but lo, plain Callender becomes Cadwallader ! This
was perhaps a mere slip, but how tempting is the alterna-
tive hypothesis, that it was a delicate touch to plant in the
midst of the noisome tale a name universally associated
with affluence and social standing.

a. Then there is the technique of misleading footnotes.
Any piece of research must be documented, but the unwary
are apt to think that anything with footnotes is a piece of
research. How many persons look up footnote references?
Myers's first footnote in his account of the Hall carbine
affair identifies Stevens as a member of a "clique involved
in custom-house frauds/' who had obtained a contract
"corruptly." The evidence justifies no allegations of either
fraud or corruption. In his next footnote Myers dwells on
the "frauds" at Frfemonf s headquarters, on the court-
martial of one Major MeKinstry, and on the bribery of
union officers. This footnote is without relevance to the
Hall carbine transaction, but, as we shall see in the pages
of a later writer, the careless reader gathers the impression
that there must be some connection. The noxious atmos-
phere contaminates the context. In his concluding citation
from his Civil War sources, Myers quotes the censure
passed on war profiteers by "the House Select Committee
on Government Contracts**; It turns out that the passage
he quotes comes from a minority report of the Committee
signed by a single member I

A LEGEND IS BORN 89

3. Only onee does Myers refer to the testimony of any
witness, and tlien he chooses, not Fremont, not Eipley, not
Eastman, not Stevens, not Ketchum, not in fact any of the
participants in the transaction, but an outsider, one Mar-
cellus Hartley. Here is what Myers says:

Marcellus Hartley, himself a dealer in arms and a self-confessed
swindler, had declared before the committee, "I think the worst thing
this Government has been swindled upon has been these confounded
Hall's carbines."

There are a number of comments to be made on this
sentence.

Myers calls Hartley a "self-confessed swindler." But
from a reading of Hartley's own testimony one gathers
the impression of a self-respecting merchant impatient with
profiteering. There is no reason in the sources that Myers
cites to think he was a swindler; certainly he was not "self-
confessed." The War Department commission, In fact,
granted the claim of Hartley's firm in full, mentioning par-
ticularly that the price asked by them for Enfield muskets
was reasonable. 1 " 8 Myers scatters defamatory words right
and left, with utter recklessness.

Again, observe how far afield Myers goes for a con-
demnation of the Hall carbine transaction. In the same
volume where Hartley's testimony appears, Morris Ket-
chum, testifying, defines to the last penny Morgan's interest
in the business, reveals his own interest in it, and gets at
the vitals of the whole affair. Myers takes no notice of the
examination of Ketchum. Instead, he digs up the obiter
dictum of a bystander, Hartley. After Hartley had testified,
a merchant named William J. Syms took the stand, and he
volunteered this comment:

I still think the Hall's carbine and the Hall's rifle as good guns as
there are in the service.

Why does Myers pick Hartley and not Syms? Or why does
he not quote both ? And how could he overlook Ketchum ?

Finally, the readers of Myers would fairly conclude that
Hartley was speaking specifically of Fremont's purchase of
carbines. Yet if he had quoted the full passage it would be

90 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

clear that Hartley was speaking in vague and general terms
of the dizzy rise in quotations for Hall arms, with special
onus on some unidentified earlier transaction. Here is the
full passage :

I think the worst thing this government has been swindled upon
has been those confounded Hall's carbines; they have been elevated
In price to $22.50, I think. They passed from hand to hand at six
dollars, ten dollars, twelve dollars, fourteen dollars, and twenty
dollars; and the man who got twenty dollars was not as much to
blame as the man who got ten dollars. [Italics not in original]

We have dwelt thus at length on the Myers text because
it was the precursor of all later accounts of the Hall carbine
episode- In the technique of controversy there is no more
effective device, however questionable, than the vigorous
assertion of alleged facts. The audience, taken disarmed,
yields ground. Time does the rest. Myers himself has
aptly (shall we say authoritatively?) described the process
in another connection : m

, . bare assertion, when repeated often enough, becomes established
as seeming truth; and the mere scrutiny of it may then be looked
upon as presumption.

Ben Ray Redman, a quarter of a century after Myers's
work appeared, distills the essence of history as Myers
writes it: "On every page of this record, greed is triumph-
ant, force ruthless, and fraud profitable/' 1 * 7 Is it to be won-
dered that Greed, Force, and Fraud always hold the field,
when Myers weaves the tapestry?

Myers's publishers, as we have seen, say that "at no
time did he indulge in tirades against personal traits."
Bearing in mind that Morgan never sold any arms and
never pressed a claim and was never called as a witness in
the Hall carbine case and was never singled out for criti-
cism, and that the arms gave satisfaction to the troops who
used them, we will close this section with Myers's final
angry diatribe on the Hall carbine case, a purple passage
to be found at the opening of the next chapter of Myers's
famous work ;

A LEGEND IS BORN 9*

Could this Morgan [of later years] be the same who started out
by successfully palming off upon the Government during the Civil
War five thousand of its own condemned rifles, and at extortionate
prices? Was it possible that the man who profited from arming the
nation's soldiers with self-slaughtering [sic] guns could be the same
Morgan whose power later was "greater than that of President^ or
kings"? Was the great, sublime patriot of subsequent times, J. Pier-
pont Morgan, the same Morgan who came into collision with investi-
gating committees during the Civil War, and who was practically
denounced in the severest language? Verily, he was the same man,
the identical same. Behold him in the budding of his career, and
observe how he began it; and behold him in after decades, glutted
with wealth and power, covered with honors, august dispenser of
benevolence, the incarnate source of all wisdom, financial and other-
wise, the mighty man of commerce and of the arts, the idol of cap-
italist ideals.

Between that Civil War transaction and his later sway, neces-
sarily there lay a long category of deeds. Undisputably he began his
career with proofs of exceptional brilliance. Had his first business
achievement that of the condemned rifles been judged by the stand-
ards of the "lower classes", he would have been thrown into prison,
or had the soldiers who had to use the guns come within his prox-
imity, the life, peradventure, might have been shot out of him then
and there.

Could there be irony more biting? The eloquence, the
display of righteous indignation, and all for what? A judge
pronounces dread judgement, while those in the secret know
that the only crime is the judge's framing of a victim.

* * *

In reviewing for The New York Times (Dec. 17, 1939)*
Herbert L. Satterlee's life of the elder Morgan, Allan Nevins
drew approving attention to the author's exculpation of
Morgan in the carbine deal (Both author and reviewer had
studied the manuscript of this book.) Gustavus Myers
thereupon addressed a long letter to the newspaper defend-
ing his version. Before publishing the Myers letter, the
Editor passed it along to Mr. Nevins, who prepared a care-
ful rejoinder, and this in turn the Editor showed to Myers.
Rather than face the confrontation, Myers withdrew his
letter, and neither saw the light of print. From other direc-
tions at about this time Myers learned that his handling of
the carbine affair was under fire. He never made a public

* Infra, p. 114.

92 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

reply. He was already engaged in preparing his final
book, he had chosen to write a history of bigotry in the
United States ! He brought this undertaking to term, thanks
to the timely aid of a Guggenheim grant, in mid- 1942. He
fell ill in August, and died some months later, at the age
of 70, on the night of Monday, December 7, 1942.

In an obituary editorial published on December 10,
The New York Times, with unintentional felicity, rounded
off the life of Gustavus Myers with a happy reiteration of
the old fiction :

His ... method was one of exhaustive and patient research
summed up in a straightforward narrative which let the facts speak

for themselves.

Lewis Corey's Version

Lewis Corey's The House of Morgan appeared in 1930,
and in it he devoted about five pages to retelling the Hall
carbine story. Like Myers, the marxist Corey won for
himself a reputation in some quarters for dependable re-
search ; John Chamberlain once said of him that he "does
not like to deal in generalities, unless they are firmly
gounded in reality". 158 Though Corey must have learned
of the Hall carbine episode from Myers's work, his version
of the episode shows that he took the trouble to consult
Myers's sources; his quotations are not the same, and he
cites the debate in Congress that Myers ignored. (For
Corey's text, see Appendix II, pp. 163-171.)

In many minor respects Corey equals Myers in fantasy,
and in one major instance he scales new heights. Like
Myers he shows no familiarity with the primary sources,
though he cites Ketchum* s testimony. He refrains from
defining Morgan's limited part in the affair, and in fact
refers to Eastman, Stevens, and Morgan as "the conspira-
tors", thus asserting that these three strangers were hand
in glove with one another. He says of the Hall arms that
they "were more dangerous to Union troops than to the
Confederates", which is wholly untrue but which sounds
suspiciously like a statement in the records about certain
obsolete Austrian muskets. 15 * He leaves with his readers
the impression that Ketchum refused to disclose to the in-
vestigating committee the amount of his commissions on
his loans to Stevens, whereas, after refusing, Ketchum
made a complete disclosure. He characterizes the Court of
Claims judgement as a "strictly technical decision", whereas
it was just the reverse : if the Court had sustained the Gov-
ernment's case by a narrow interpretation of the statute,
it would have tied the hands of any commanding general
in hopeless red tape. He repeats Myers's mistake that the
Stevens decision was an important precedent favoring
numerous undeserving claimants against the Government
In a footnote he garbles Stevens's connection with the cus-

94 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

toms service, making up an allegation that Stevens con-
fessed to paying $42,000 In bribes and giving an errone-
ous citation for his source.

But these are all details in comparison with Corey's
dazzling contribution to the Hall carbine saga. On page 61
of The House of Morgan he says this:*

, . . .The claim for payment, Morgan insisted, was justified because
his House had "made advances in good faith to Mr. Stevens on the
security of his agreement with General Fremont." This claim of
"good faith" was dismissed by the committee since Morgan "declined
to disclose the terms" upon which the advances were made to Stevens.
The committee said:

"Nor is it an unfair inference, from the unwillingness evidenced
by the House in question [J. Pierpont Morgan & Co.] to state the
terms on which their advances were made, that if these terms were
disclosed they might supply evidence that, during the negotiations for
funds, doubts as to the sufficiency of the security had actually pre-
sented themselves, and that the confidence claimed to have been felt
by them was largely mingled with distrust."

On referring to Corey's source one finds that the refer-
ence is not to Morgan, but to Ketchum, Son & Co. Corey
has simply substituted Morgan's name for Ketchum's, and
thus brought down on Morgan's head an official reprimand
directed against others. Immediately afterwards Corey
proceeds to quote a "discourse . , . on equity and good citi-
zenship" that he alleges was directed in the report at
"Stevens, Morgan, Ketchum, and Eastman". On referring*
to the original, one finds that the context at this point in
the report refers expressly and solely to Stevens.

Here, in Corey's text, we find altered documents mas-
querading as history.

Who was this "Lewis Corey" whose books on Morgan
and capitalism drew generous attention from reviewers in
the early 1 930*3 ? zw His publishers did not disclose his iden-
tity, and the reviewers failed to dig it out. "Lewis Corey"
was not the author's original name : he was born in Italy in
1892 or thereabouts a& Louis C. Fraina. Under that name
he was convicted by a jury in federal court early in the

* The name in brackets In the second paragraph appears thus in Corey's text.

LEWIS COREY'S VERSION 95

First World War on a charge of conspiring to defeat the
draft act. In the ensuing years he was conspicuous as a
Communist leader and writer, and visited Moscow and
Mexico. It is said that he returned to the United States in
the summer of 1923 across the Mexican border: we are
unable to say what passport and name he used at that time.
After a falling out with the Communist party, he dropped
from sight for some years, emerging as "Lewis Corey"
toward the end of the 1920*3. He soon resumed his cam-
paigning on behalf of Communist candidates, and in the
early 1930*8 he appeared under his new name in the list of
Assistant Editors of the Encyclopaedia of the Social
Sciences, a fifteen volume work published by Macmillan and
edited by Edwin R. A. Seligman and Alvin Johnson. Later
he joined the faculty of Antioch College, in Ohio.

The Story Told at Fourth Hand

The New York Times on February 21, 1932, published
in the Book Review section a letter from Gustavus Myers
in which he made a serious complaint:

Frequent recent instances of authors appropriating material from
various of my books induce me to request the courtesy of your col-
umns for a protest.

The research alone on my books has taken years of exhaustive
work. Frequently this has entailed the exploration and study of
thousands of documents the contents of which had never been inves-
tigated. The ascertainment and development of a single fact has
sometimes taken months of hard labor. Likewise inquiry into the
complete verification of a fact in all of its phases or the unfounded
nature of an allegation has necessitated much time and the applica-
tion of resourcefulness in the faculty of research.

Obviously the full references that I give to these documents con-
stitute one of the most valuable essentials of my books, Without,
however, specifically pointing out these books as the sources of their
easily acquired information, the authors in question adopt an evasive
practice. They give a list of the documents, representing them by
omission of the source as the results of their own original research.
No mention is made of the pioneer works from which this documen-
tary information was lifted, but casual reference is made to some
expression in my books as though all that was taken comprised an
incidental statement.

Whatever may be the merits of Myers's research work
(and we have seen how critics have taken him at his own
valuation), his complaint about pirating, at least as to the
Hall carbine affair, was amply justified. Apart from Corey,
there is no clear evidence that any writer has hitherto
troubled to go behind Myers and his sources when re-
writing the legend. Myers is entitled to full credit. We
have seen that Myers and Corey relied on secondary sources,
so that their narratives are, so to speak, at third hand. The
following versions of the tale, being based on Myers and
Corey, are therefore at fourth hand.

i.

In 1930 The Vanguard Press brought out John K.
Winkler's Morgan the Magnificent The page that he devotes

96

THE STORY TOLD AT FOURTH HAND 97

to the carbine episode is drawn solely from Myers, almost
every sentence being directly traceable. (For text see
Appendix III, pp. 172-174.) At the same time it is a
farrago of Myers, hardly a sentence being faithfully re-
stated. Winkler joins Eastman and Stevens (utter strangers
to each other) in partnership. He has tests (non-existent)
showing the carbines to be obsolete. He has Fremont refus-
ing payment for the carbines, whereas Fremont advocated
payment in full. He has the award of the War Department
commission jumbled beyond remedy. He quotes the Court
of Claims as reaching the jejune conclusion that "a con-
tract is a contract/* whereas this is Myers's wording, and
a preposterous travesty of the Court's decision. Finally,
he concludes with what purports to be a direct quotation
from Gustave [sic] Myers about the effect of the decision
on our old friends the "deadhorse" claims; but the direct
quotation turns out to be a paraphrase with liberal em-
bellishments. Winkler adds his own mite to the snow-
balling legend: he says that the carbine episode provoked
ugly charges that pursued Morgan all his life, which "so far
as the writer is aware" he never answered. The fact is
that no one before Myers criticised Morgan's part in the
affair. It is doubtful whether Morgan ever read Myers,
and he certainly left this world undisturbed by charges
connected with the Hall carbine transaction.

2.

In March 1934, the choice of the Book-of-the-Month
Club was Matthew Josephson's The Robber Barons, pub-
lished by Harcourt, Brace & Co. His page on our Hall
carbine affair is a blend of Myers and Corey* (For text see
Appendix IV, pp. 175-179.) He has the carbines shoot-
ing "off the thumbs of the soldiers using them", copying
Myers's invention. He has Morgan pressing a claim for
the full payment of the arms, which is again Myers's mis-
take. He has a Government committee demanding "that
Morgan disclose the terms upon which he had entered the
transaction, though without breaking his obdurate silence/'

gS THE HALL CABBINB AFFAIR

which was Corey's changeling; and, following Corey, he
applies to Morgan "and his fellows" the sermon that the
War Department commission directed at Stevens.

3 and 4.

In May 1934, the Book~of-the~Month Club honored with
its selection Merchants of Death, by H. C, Engelbrecht,
Ph.D., and F. C. Hanighen, published by Dodd, Mead & Co.
Almost simultaneously, Harper & Brothers brought out
George Seldes's Iron, Blood and Profits. (For texts see
Appendices V and VI, pp. 180-186.) Both books dealt
with the trade in munitions and their authors did not over-
look the Hall carbine episode. They merely paraphrase
Myers, and though Seldes mentions Myers in his text, and
the other book cites Myers in a footnote, no reader would
guess their utter dependence on the History of the Great
American Fortunes. All that they do is to condense the
original, iron out some of Myers's angularities of style, and
assert baldly what Myers implied. Note, for example, the
parallelism in the extracts on the page that follows this:

Myers:

THE STOEY TOLD AT FOURTH HAND

Engelbrecht & Hamghen:

. . , Five thousand of them, however, still remained
in the army arsenal in New York and were there
when the Civil War broke out.

On May 28, 1861 one Arthur M. Eastman, of Man-
chester, New Hampshire, made an offer to the Gov-
ernment to buy these rifles at $3 each.

Knowing the great frauds going on in the furnishing
of army supplies, the Government officials might well
have been suspicious of this offer, but apparently did
not question its good faith. The rifles were sold to
Eastman at $3.50 each. But either Eastman lacked
the money for payment, or had been thrust forward
to act as a dummy for a principal in the background.
One Simon Stevens then stepped on the scene, agree-
ing to back Eastman to the extent of $20,000, which
sum was to be applied for payment for the rifles; as
collateral security Stevens took a lien upon the rifles.
But from whom did Stevens get the funds? The
official and legal records show that it was from J.
Pierpont Morgan.

The next step in this transaction was in Stevens'
telegraphing, on August 5, 1861, a notification to Gen-
eral Fremont, commanding at St. Louis, that he had
five thousand new carbines, in perfect condition, and
inquiring whether Fremont would take them.

From Fremont's headquarters came word to ship them
to the army headquarters at St. Louis at once. During
all of this time the carbines had remained at the
arsenal m New York City.

Upon receiving Fremont's order, Morgan paid the
Government the sum of $17,486 at the rate of $3.50
a carbine.

The rifles were shipped direct from the arsenal to St.
Louis.

And what was the sum charged upon the Government
for them? The bill made out to Fremont called for
the payment of $22 apiece for the consignment.

... In 1861 there still remained
5,000 of these condemned guns.

Suddenly on May 28, 1861, one
Arthur M. Eastman appeared
and offered $3 apiece for them.

This high price should have
made the officials suspicious, but
apparently it did not.

Back of Eastman was a certain
Simon Stevens who was fur-
nishing the cash for the transac-
tion, but the real backer of the
enterprise was J. P. Morgan.

After the condemned guns
had been contracted for, Stevens
sent a wire to General Fremont
at St. Louis informing him that
he had 5,000 new carbines in
perfect condition. Did Fremont
want them?

Immediately an order (amount-
ing to a contract) arrived from
Fremont urging that the guns
be sent at once.

The guns were brought from the
government and Morgan paid
$3.50 apiece for them, a total of
$17,486. These condemned car-
bines were now moved out of
the government arsenal and sent
to Fremont.

and the bill presented was $22
a piece that is $109,912, a profit
of $92,426.

99

Seldes:

... In 1 86 1 there were still
some 5,000 of these rifles await-
ing sale in the New York ar-
senal.

A certain Mr. Arthur Eastman,
of Manchester, New Hampshire,
offered $3 each for the lot, but
the authorities asked more and
finally compromised on $3.50.

Eastman, however, could not
find the cash, but eventually ob-
tained it from Simon Stevens.
There are legal records showing
that the man who supplied the
money to Stevens was the origi-
nal J. P. Morgan.

General Fremont, in St. Louis,
was overjoyed when on August
5, 1861, he received a telegram
from Stevens offering him 5,000
new carbines, in perfect condi-
tion.

It meant everything to Fre-
mont's command. He gave the
order to purchase.

J. P. Morgan thereupon paid
over exactly $17,486 to the New
York authorities and shipped
the guns to the Missouri au-
thorities. The shipment went
from arsenal to arsenal.

General Fremont paid $22 each
for the condemned guns.

THE STORY TOLD AT FOURTH HAND IOI

Everyone who dips into the original records of the Hall
carbine case learns at once that between the delivery of
the arms to Eastman and the shipment to Fremont they
were rifled, most of them at a gunsmith's in New York but
some in Massachusetts. Myers, erroneously, says that "the
rifles were shipped direct from the arsenal to St. Louis."
Engelbrecht and Hanighen say they "were moved out of
the government arsenal and sent to Fremont." Seldes is
most terse: "The shipment went from arsenal to arsenal."
So error goes echoing down the corridors of quack-history.

Messrs. Engelbrecht and Hanighen conclude their ac-
count with the usual formulas: how the carbines shot off
the thumbs of Fremont's soldiers, how this aroused great
indignation and held up payment of "Morgan's bill"; how
Morgan brought suit; how Morgan rejected a compromise
settlement that would have netted him a profit of $49,000 ;
how he sued in Stevens's name and won the case, the Court
holding that "a contract is sacred" (this phrase, in quota-
tion marks, is attributed to the Court, but, as we have
pointed out before, it is not in the Court's decision, being
merely a variant of Myers's invention, "a contract is a con-
tract") ; and how the decision was the opening wedge for
"hundreds of other 'deadhorse claims' ". These authors
then wind up with the Marcellus Hartley quotation.

It will be recalled that Myers in a footnote discussed
bribery among Union officers and the court martial of a
Major McKinstry. Merely by contiguity (since the matter
was unrelated to Morgan) the bad odor of this footnote
was apt to communicate itself to Morgan. Seldes proved a
victim to Myers's footnote, for he informs his readers that
the bribery and court martial were an outcome of the in-
vestigation of J. Pierpont Morgan !

Seldes of course has the carbines shooting "off at least
[sic] the thumbs of the Union soldiers trying to use them."
(Neither he nor any of our other writers stops to explain
how this was done.) He has Morgan pressing his claim,
the suit being known as J. Pierpont Morgan vs. The United

*02 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

States Government, our old familiar phantom suit. He
has the Court sustaining Morgan, against every equitable
dictate, on the ground yes, the reader has guessed that
"a contract is a contract."

The Legend Becomes Accepted Fact

Now we enter the home stretch.

We have seen how Myers and Corey composed the
anecdote of the Civil War carbine transaction, and how the
authors of other popular books passed it on with embellish-
ments, all of them foisting it off as honest history. We shall
now show the extraordinary success achieved by the authors
of this legend.

No one can ever assemble a complete collection of ref-
erences to a legend. Those that are oral are usually writ
only in air, and printed references are scattered with the
prodigality and carelessness of nature. With casual effort,
however, we have gathered together over the course of sev-
eral years a copious anthology of references to the Hall car-
bine case. Our sampling of what must be an enormous
volume of material will show how rich a crop of tares will
grow in the end from one false seed. The Hall carbine
affair has become a stock devil in the thinking habits of
our time, to be dug up at the right moment and cited as a
typical illustration of the morals of capitalism.

Book Revieivers. Myers's work was not popular, and
seems to have drawn only moderate attention when it
appeared. But by the 1920'$ it had become required read-
ing among certain "intellectuals", and therefore we find
that the book reviewers who introduced to the public the
various apocryphal accounts of the 1930'$ welcomed the
retelling of the Hall carbine affair as an old friend. When
it comes to facts, after all, critics are at a disadvantage
with authors, and they often give the authors the benefit of
any doubts. Thus the most conscientious critics accepted
the Hall carbine yarn, and through the columns of the most
responsible journals gave it wide circulation.

R. L. Duffus, in his front-page review in The New York
Times book section of Winkler's Morgan the Magnificent,
cited the Hall carbine affair as an episode in the early life
of Morgan that "in these enlightened latter days" called
"for the exercise of charitable judgment" And then he
went on to say:

103

104- THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

He took to finance, as Winkler states, "as a cat to cream". In
company with two other men, he bought carbines at $3.50 (the story
goes that they were condemned) and resold them to the government
for $22. each. [Aug. 31, 1930]

Eobert Morse Lovett, reviewing the same book for The New
Republic, was ironically charitable :

Mr. Winkler does not conceal his [Morgan's] part ... in the pur-
chase of condemned carbines from the New York Arsenal for $3.50
apiece and their resale to General Fremont for $22, although he sug-
gests that Morgan did not know how bad the muskets were. How-
ever, since later wars have demonstrated that to poison soldiers with
embalmed beef, to expose sailors to death behind rotten armor plate,
to burn up aviators in leaky airplanes is compatible with the highest
patriotism, it is not worth while to dwell on this phase of Morgan's
career. [Oct. 15, 1930]

Readers of The New Republic were to be offered more
details a few months later, when Burton Rascoe reviewed
Corey's The House of Morgan:

Mean-spirited critics, observing only facts and not the high pur-
pose behind them, might be inclined to call Morgan at that age [24]
... a swindler and a profiteer in the blood and sacrifice of other
men. . . , At the outbreak of hostilities there were in the New York
arsenal 5,000 carbines which had been condemned by the army in-
specting officers as obsolete and dangerous: they had a habit of ex-
ploding in the breech, maiming or killing the soldiers who fired them.
In a deal promoted by one Arthur Eastman, and financed by J. P.
Morgan through a speculator named Simon Stevens, these dangerous
carbines were sold at a huge profit to General Fremont in St. Louis,
who was badly pressed for arms, while the carbines were still the
property of the government and no actual cash had been put up by
the sellers. [Feb. n, 1931]

Allan Nevins in his review of Josephson's The Robber
Barons told the readers of The Saturday Review of Literor-
ture in the issue of March 3, 1934, that in it they would
find "the now familiar story" of the "unsavory" carbine
contract. Robert Cantwell in his review in The New Re-
public of March 14, 1934, noted that Josephson gives us "a
glimpse ... of Morgan selling rejected guns to the govern-
ment". In the same weekly, only six issues later, Quincy
Howe, reviewing Merchants of Death, informed his readers

THE LEGEND BECOMES ACCEPTED FACT 105

flatly that "the senior X P. Morgan unloaded defective rifles
on the Union army, subsequently suing the government for
full payment/'

The authors of the apocryphal accounts, in their later
writings, have sometimes reverted to the Hall carbine
affair to adorn a tale. In 1938 Matthew Josephson followed
up his Robber Barons with a new book, The Politicos, in
which on p. 77 he trots out the story:

The contracts for the defective Hall's carbines, which wounded the
very soldiers who fired them, in whose financing the youthful J. P.
Morgan was involved, . . , were contracted for through agents who
were influential figures in the new Republican Organization.

Again, H. C. Engelbrecht, co-author of Merchants of Death,
retold the story at some length in The Adult Bible Class
Magazine, in May 1934. According to him, the Hall car-
bines were "useless and dangerous", and the Government
had given orders to sell them "as curios" for about a dollar
apiece. The man behind the offer to buy them was J. P.
Morgan, Sr. "When Fremont's soldiers tried to fire the
carbines, they shot off their own thumbs", and following
great public indignation, the Government "refused to pay
Morgan's bill". But "Morgan finally won and collected in
full for condemned rifles which he had bought from the
Government for $3.50 and sold back immediately at $22."

Radical Press. From an early date the socialist and
communist press has worked the carbine affair tirelessly.
The earliest quotation that we have found appeared in the
Milwaukee Leader early in 191 7 : m

It is notorious that war contracts are filled with graft Most of
America's swollen fortunes had their origin in the corruption flow-
ing out of the Civil War.

The house of Morgan came into prominence in the Civil War when
the late J. Pierpont Morgan, then winning his spurs as a fledgling
financier, bought condemned muskets from the Government for $2*75
[sic], and without even unpacking them turned around and resold
them to the War Department for $19.50 [sic].

106 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

(It is diverting: to observe the endless variety in the details
of the affair in successive references.)

Twenty-four years later the radical New Ulm, Minne-
sota, Journal was repeating the old song :

The foundations of the House of Morgan were laid during the
Civil War when the elder Morgan bought discarded union rifles at
bargain prices and then sold them back to the government at many
times their cost, [Jan. 29, 1941]

The Communist Daily Worker has an insatiable appe-
tite for our Hall carbines. We have not perused its files
exhaustively, and so the following excerpts probably are
only a few out of many. The Sunday Worker on January
26, 1936, told the old, old story in these words:

It was at the opening of the Civil War, though, that he [Morgan]
made his first big ripple in the rich pond of finance, when he unloaded
guns on a Union general for $22.00 a piece which he bought from the
Government for $3.50 each guns which had been condemned as
obsolete and dangerous, and which would shoot the thumbs off soldiers
using them!

And again the Daily Worker, in a book review on April
6, 1936, went over the same ground:

The Morgan firm made a pretty bargain in the Civil War by buy-
ing condemned guns from the government for a song and selling
these same guns back to the government at high prices for use by
Northern soldiers.

The subject of the review was Anna Rochester's Rulers of
America, and the comment was a paraphrase of what she
had written.

In an editorial on June 9, 1937, the Daily Worker re-
peated the dose:

The Morgans started their rise to fortune when the elder Morgan
sold defective rifles to the Lincoln government during the Civil War
so that thousands [sic] of young American mechanics and farmer
boys probably died horrible deaths to provide the Morgans with
profiteering riches.

On June 8, 1940, Louis F. Budenz in a front page edi-
torial denounced a transaction between the United States

THE LEGEND BECOMES ACCEPTED PACT 107

Government and the U. S. Steel Corporation by comparing
its "stench" with "J, P. Morgan's original stealings from
the Government in the Civil War," when he bought " 'old'
rifles . . . from the American Government . . . and sold
[them] right back again at skyrocketing prices."

A few months later, on August 18, 1940, another writer
told the readers of the Daily Worker that J. P. Morgan
during the Civil War had not needed "a yacht to fleece the
Union. He sold the struggling republic a batch of old rifles
which backfired on the soldiers during battle."

On October 15, 1940, still another writer in the columns
of the same paper gave a new variation to the story:

Morgan, with the help of his friend Ketchum, bought 5,000 con-
demned carbines from the United States army arsenal for $3.50 each
and sold them back to another unit of the government for $22, at a
profit of $92,000, The facts are on record in a Congressional report.

Taking our leave of the Daily Worker, we now offer a
citation from the writings of the communist wit who bears
the pen name of Robert Forsythe: 110

. . . The Union must be forever grateful to the elder Morgan who
kept industry alive during the Civil War by purchasing faulty rifles
from the government at $2 each and selling them back to the govern-
ment at $15 each. The business stimulation caused by such transac-
tions not only resulted in tlie establishment of the Morgan fortune
which has done so much for American culture but undoubtedly helped
to shorten the war.

Other Newspapers. The Philadelphia Record, in an
editorial attack on Bethlehem Steel Corporation on Febru-
ary 9, 1936, referred to the courts that "upheld the elder
J. P. Morgan's sale of worthless rifles to the army during
the Civil War." The Daily News (New York) informed
its enormous Sunday circulation on April 14, 1935, through
its special writer Lowell Limpus:

. . . Jay Gould, John Jacob Astor, the elder Morgan, Marshall Field
and old Commodore Vanderbilt are among the fortune founders whose
methods have been sharply criticised. High points in such criticism
include .... Morgan's sale of condemned rifles to the Government
which condemned them in Civil War days.

108 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

On June 6, 1937, the same newspaper, relying on Gustavus
Myers, wallowed in all the details of the affair in a scari-
fying feature article about the sordidness of wealthy men :

Morgan's first stroke of business genius selling condemned car-
bines to soldiers might well have caused their death had not the
ruse been discovered. . , . Like Mephistopheles whispering into the
ear of Faust, young Morgan tiptoed behind these men [Eastman and
Simeon (sic) Stevens] counselling, advising, and paying off. . . .

When Congress noticed what had happened it refused to pay the
claim. Morgan pressed suit. Finally it was decided that the Gov-
ernment would pay $13.31 each for the carbines. The Government sent
a check for $55,550. That didn't satisfy Morgan. He and Stevens
sued again to get at least $17 per carbine. That was the amount the
Government paid for brand new guns. They won. The Government
sent another check for $49,000!

A nice profit for the grandson of John Pierpont, chaplain of the
22d Massachusetts Regiment during the American Revolution! And
something for the 36,463 lads in blue and gray to think about before
they were reported kitted, wounded, or missing at Seven Days, Va.
[sic] [Italics in original.]

As an example of the uses to which the legend can be
put, here is an argument used by the Pickens, S. C., Sentinel
on January 16, 1936, to prove that big* business is without
conscience :

One of Bryan's most inveterate and fiercest political enemies was
the elder J. P. Morgan, and it was natural. To show the different
viewpoints of these two great personalities, we might mention that at
the beginning of the War between the States the elder J. P. Morgan
was a party to selling the United States Government 5,000 guns
which four years before had been condemned as unserviceable and
dangerous. Private parties bought the guns at $3.50 each and resold
them to representatives of the Union at $22.00 each. For a second
time the guns were discovered to be obsolete. It required a suit in
Federal court to collect but Mr. Morgan got his money.

Now we quote The Argonaut, staid West Coast weekly,
of June 18, 1937:

... It would not have been advisable for the elder J. Pierpont Morgan
to have commented very audibly on his transaction with the war de-
partment of Abraham Lincoln, in which he succeeded in selling back
to the government carbines which had been condemned by the gov-
ernment, and selling them for twenty-two dollars apiece, though he
had paid but three dollars and a half apiece for them.

THE LEGEND BECOMES ACCEPTED FACT 109

And next we turn to the Journal of the Canadian
Bankers' Association, which in April 1936 passed along to
its sober subscribers this account of a wicked deed :

. . . The government was sorely in need of carbines, and on hearing
from one Simon Stevens that he had 5,000 pieces for sale, arranged
for their immediate purchase. Stevens, who had no carbines what-
ever, began to look around for some, cheap, and through a friend
named Eastman, bought 5,000 condemned carbines, borrowing the
money to pay for the spot purchase from J. Pierpont Morgan and Co.
Eastman, in turn, got the carbines from the government, paying $3.50
each for them, Stevens taking them with a wink and selling them
back to the government at $22. This was no doubt considered quite a
snappy piece of business, in view of the fact that, first, the govern-
ment was buying its own property and, second, the guns were no good.
The subsequent investigation, of course, brought out young Morgan's
share in the transaction, but he claimed "good faith" as a defence.
Stevens and Eastman were proved to be a couple of rogues and had
no defence whatever. [April, 1936]

Perhaps the most curious journalistic variation of the
carbine yarn appeared in PM, January 5, 1941. In a column
purporting to recall happenings of long ago, under the
heading :

Fifty Years Ago

(1891)
this newspaper asserts :

J. PIERPONT MORGAN is cursed by Civil War veterans for buying, in
1861, bad rifles from an army post at $3.50 apiece and reselling them
to another army post at $22 apiece. The rifles, if fired, would blow
soldiers* thumbs off.

The alleged indignation of the veterans in 1891 is a fabrica-
tion compounded with an anachronism, because Myers did
not invent the yarn until almost two more decades had
passed.

The Demagogms. Huey Long over the radio on Feb-
ruary 10, 1935, explained to his listeners the methods used
for making great fortunes: 1 * 8

. . . Well, ladies and gentlemen, there never were fortunes made in
any country through as many tactics of brigandages and through as

110 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

many crimes and demeanors [sic] of men in his position as the Amer-
ican fortunes. I am not going to undertake to defame those men, but
I can take you any fortune you wish to write me about and show you
it has not been amassed by any tactics other than by force and
crimes, I can take you the Morgan fortune, the Rockefeller fortune,
or the Mellon fortune, or any fortune you wish to inquire about. . . .
The Morgan fortune was started by J. P. Morgan, Jr., [sic] who
was the father of the J. P. Morgan of today, selling some refused car-
bines to Fremont's army.

Senator Rush Holt of West Virginia, on December 30,
1940, on the floor of the Senate, in the course of a lusty
attack on the Morgan family asked Ms hearers :

Just look at the record of the Morgans from the beginning, going
back to the Civil War, when J. Pierpont Morgan's parent [sic] sold
old obsolete muskets to the United States Army in order to make a
profit out of them. . [Congressional Record, p. 21,717]

Literati. From the excerpts given thus far, the reader
might gather that the Hall carbine legend has appealed only
to radicals, demagogues, and hurried journalists. But wait
and see. We shall now pass in review the Serious Thinkers.

Bertrand Russell knows his Myers, for the following
extract from Freedom versus Organization comes straight
from the History of the Great American Fortunes:

The great fortunes of subsequent times owed their origin to the
conditions which existed during the Civil War, which afforded excep-
tional opportunities for corruption. Pierpont Morgan, for example,
then a young man of twenty-four, bought, in combination with two
other men, five thousand carbines, condemned as old and dangerous,
from the Government in the East for three and a half dollars each,
and sold them to the troops on the Mississippi for twenty-two dollars
each. The matter was investigated by a Congressional Committee and
(for the Secretary of War) by a commission of two, one of whom
was Robert Owen's son, Robert Dale Owen. Although the facts were
established, Morgan and his friends got their money,

EL G. Wells prefers Winkler. Observe how in The
Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind he stresses the
elder Morgan's efforts to "live down" the story* It will be
recalled that this was Winkler's distinctive contribution to
the saga :

THE LEGEND BECOMES ACCEPTED PACT in

After the panic came the Civil War, and the young speculator
seems to have burnt his fingers and involved himself in a manner
difficult to explain over the purchase and resale to the government of
5,000 condemned carbines. He never did explain. He was too much
of an aristocrat. Apparently he was misled and blundered and learnt
a lesson and went on stoically to live the story down.

Harry Elmer Barnes, ever ready to heap obloquy on
capitalist devils, does not hesitate when confronted with the
Hall carbine transaction : 1W

Even in the armament industry the bankers have set the pace for
chicanery. Few armament manufacturers have duplicated J. P. Mor-
gan, Sr.'s sale of defective arms to John C. Fremont during the
Civil War.

The version of our carbine affair presented in 1938 by
David Loth in Public Plunder: A History of Graft in
America, achieves an unenviable record. This writer, dili-
gent in his research among the apocryphal writers, suc-
ceeded in combining all the errors of all his predecessors.
According to him, Stevens, when he entered the scene, "had
come East as the General's agent to buy supplies." General
Fremont was "undeterred by the fact that he had no au-
thority for such purchases and perhaps ignorant of the
limitations on his power as a commanding officer." Stevens
took "young Morgan into partnership", and Morgan before
making his loan was convinced by Fremont's telegram that
profit was certain. Fremont was left wondering why the
carbines did not arrive while they were being rifled in the
East. Stevens and Eastman "did not know . . . that this
particular Hall model had a firing mechanism so devised
that it was about an even chance whether the soldier who
used it sent a ball in the general direction of the enemy or
blew off his own thumb. The weapon had been condemned
originally for this peculiarity after repeated accidents.
While Stevens and Morgan were reckoning their profits,
Fremont's men were learning at the cost of several thumbs
that Major Stevens had not told the exact truth about the
standards attained by his purchase." Morgan, "very in-
sistent upon his rights, . . . was heard at the War Depart-
ment." Stevens finally won his appeal, "despite an inter-

112 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

vening confession to bribery in another connection." And,
finally, "Morgan's role remained passive to the end. He
aimply offered stolid refusals to disclose the nature of his
contract with Stevens. That, he said, was his own very
private business." . , . Each of these statements, as the
reader knows, is unsupported or belied by the original
records.

Late in 1936 there was published in England a book 167
translated from the French, entitled The Profits of War, by
one Richard Lewinsohn. The author tells the carbine story,
having relied on a German translation of Myers. Thus the
tale, in being re-presented to English readers, had boxed
the compass of Europe. The Lewinsohn book later appeared
in the United States, published by Button, and the New
York Post on July 20, 1937, picked out for verbatim quota-
tion the paragraph about the Hall carbines. And so we find
the carbine legend done into German, thence paraphrased
into French, from French translated back into English and
published in England, re-published in the United States,
and copied in the Post

In 1939 Chatto & Windus brought out in England a
book dealing with the financial aspects of art, entitled Art
Lies Bleeding, by Francis Watson. On p. 141 the author
draws a moral :

J. P. Morgan spent 10,000,000 on his collections, the greater part of
it through a single firm. But what must have been the expenses of
becoming the favourite dealer of a man clever enough to have bought
5^000 condemned carbines from the New York armoury for 17,500
dollars and sold them to the Federal Army in the Civil War for
109,912 dollars?

The carbine deal even figures in fiction, so that we have
fiction compounding fiction. Upton Sinclair in World's End,
1940, p. 418, has this engaging bit:

In a kind and fatherly way the banker reminded the impetuous
lad that the nation was at war. "Our boys are going overseas to die
in a cause which may not be perfect but how often do you meet
absolute perfection in this world? There has never been a war in
which some persons didn't profiteer at the expense of the govern-

THE LEGEND BECOMES ACCEPTED FACT 113

ment. The same thing happened in the Civil War, but that didn't
keep it from being a war to preserve the Union."

"I know'*, said Lanny. "My father has told me about that also.
He says that was how J. P. Morgan made the start of his fortune
by selling- condemned rifles to the Union Government."

John Dos Passos in 1919 (published in 1932), p. 337,
finds occasion to say:

When the guns started booming at Fort Sumter, young Morgan
turned some money over reselling condemned muskets to the U. S.
army. . . .

Carl Sandburg In his monumental Abraham Lincoln,
The War Years, was seduced by Myers and the other
apocryphal writers. He refers to

the fraudulent arms, which inspection proved were so defective they
would shoot off the thumbs of soldiers using them. [vol. i, p. 428]

He goes on to say that

Morgan presented to Congress in connection with this firearms sale
exorbitant claims for money due him as a lender, while he refused to
answer questions that would disclose the terms on which he had
entered the deal. An array of respectable citizens presenting extor-
tionate demands was the target of the committee's declaration: "He
cannot be looked on as a good citizen . ." etc.

Myers's Supreme Triumph. Recent years have seen the
publication in America of two works of reference that
deservedly enjoy high esteem, the Columbia Encyclopaedia
and the Dictionary of American Biography. In the space
that they devote to the life of J. P. Morgan, each of them
gives less than a sentence to the Hall carbine case; but
Myers can boast that he has left his spoor in these endur-
ing volumes.

The Columbia Encyclopaedia says :

His [Morgan's] financial backing of Stevens, who sold obsolete
guns to the federal government during the Civil War, . . received
severe criticism.

It received no criticism until Myers wrote his work; and
the guns were not obsolete.

114 E HA]LL CARBINE AFFAIE

The Dictionary of American Biography says :

Two incidents of his relatively inconspicuous career during that
era of profiteering and speculative orgy do not redound to his credit.
To Simon Stevens, who sold to the federal government obsolete Hall's
carbines, he gave financial backing, though he withdrew from the
case before Stevens finally brought successful suit for payment in

full

Again, the guns are disparaged unduly ; and the intimation
that Morgan "withdrew" a claim is erroneous, for he never

presented one.

$ * *

In 1939 three books appeared in which, at long last, the
Hall carbine affair was presented in true perspective.
Allan Kevins in his revised life of Fremont told the story
accurately, with emphasis on Fremont's part in it

Shortly afterwards F. S. Crofts & Co. published a Case-
book in American Business History, by two Harvard pro-
fessors, N. S. B. Gras, who holds the Straus chair in Busi-
ness History, and Henrietta M. Larson. In the chapter on
Morgan they wrote:

. . The other episode is the Hall carbine affair. The story is too long
to recount here, but an extensive search has failed to uncover any
contemporary proof that justifies the deductions about Morgan's busi-
ness character which many writers have drawn from the episode.

Before the end of the year Macmillan brought out Her-
bert L. Satterlee's life of J. Pierpont Morgan, in which the
episode was summarized. In reviewing this work for The
New York Times, Allan Nevins called special attention to
the carbine matter:*

Mr. Satterlee offers a convincing exculpation of Morgan from one of
the charges most frequently brought against him: the allegation that
in iS6i he assisted one Simon Stevens in operations which defrauded
the Federal Government upon a sale of defective Hall carbines to
General Fremont's army. The carbines were not really defective, but
were a valuable arm. What loss the government suffered was attrib-
uted in the main to the carelessness of its own War Department, and
Morgan was never a party at interest in the transaction, being merely
the person from whom one of those parties borrowed some money.
[Dec. 17, 1939]

* Supra, p. 91.

THE LEGEND BECOMES ACCEPTED FACT 115

The Nevins review was only one of many references by
critics to the new account of the carbine episode in the
Satterlee book. The Associated Press carried the story at
some length on November 26, 1939, The reviewer in Time
raised a question about it in the issue of December 18,
which prompted letters of comment from Herbert L. Satter-
lee, Lewis Corey, and Gordon Roberts in the issues of Feb-
ruary 5 and 19, 1940.

And now John T. Flynn in his Men of Wealth, pub-
lished by Simon and Schuster in the spring of 1941, pro-
vides us with our closing citation, one that has a piquancy
all its own. Flynn in the seven pages that he devotes to the
Hall carbine affair pummels Herbert L, Satterlee with
brawny vigor. He disputes Satterlee's statements every
inch of the way. Gustavus "Meyer" (as Flynn calls Myers)
was right, it seems, and Flynn goes on :

I have read all the source material completely and it is quite obvious
that Mr. Meyer [sic], Mr. Corey, and Mr. Sandburg have done so.
The most charitable explanation of Mr. Satterlee's account is that he
did not, but depended probably upon some hired assistant to bring
him the facts, which were brought to him to his taste.

Flynn asserts that originally Morgan was to get a split in
Stevens's profits, but for this he cites no authority. He
says it is "palpably untrue** that Morgan never made a
claim after he was paid off out of the first receipts from
the sale of the arms. That Morgan was never summoned
as a witness in any of the investigations means nothing,
for, according to Flynn, the young banker was in Europe
while the House Committee and the Ordnance Commission
were gathering evidence. (The fact is that the House Com-
mittee was taking Eastman's and Stevens's testimony be-
fore Morgan sailed for Europe in October 1861; and the
Ordnance Commission was assembling exhibits and taking
testimony after he returned to New York, in the following
spring.) Flynn swallows whole the fables about the quality
of the Hall arms. As to the Court of Claims yes, the reader
guesses right again Flynn says it "held that the govern-
ment had made a contract* was bound by it" In brief,

Ii6 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

from first to last, with a fine show of self-assurance, he
trumpets the triumph of Gustavus "Meyer". Reviewing
the Flynn book in The New York Times, Ralph Thompson
singled out the handling of the carbine episode for special
commendation, describing it as "what looks like the^best
sum-up of the notorious Hall Carbine case there is in
print/' (June 4, 1941)

The joke, of course, is on Mr. Flynn, for his own state-
ment of the facts shows that, far from being familiar with
"all the source material", he ignores the very existence of
the primary sources. In rushing, with shillelagh swinging,
to the rescue of his Gustavus "Meyer", he made the mis-
take of assuming that the sources cited in Myers's footnotes
were the only ones, or at least the vital ones. Flynn never
examines critically even these secondary sources, and he
never goes behind Myers and the secondary sources to the
wealth of primary material on which an independent judge-
ment must be founded.

Since the first edition of this book appeared in the fall
of 1941, the Hall carbine legend has gone marching on.
A reference to it was woven into a novel called The Copper-
heads, by one William Blake, published in 1941 by The Dial
Press; see p. 515. The Capital Times of Madison, Wis.,
used it in an editorial article on January 22, 1942. When
Mr. J. P. Morgan died in March 1943, it cropped up in
obituary comment in the communist Sunday Worker and
on a German propaganda broadcast intercepted by the
Office of War Information, both on the same day, March
13, and in PM the next day. The New Leader made use
of it on March 27. References to it appeared in editorials
in the communist Worker on July 14, 1946; in the St. Peters-
burg, Fla., Independent on July 23 ; and in the New York
Post on August 2; and the context suggests that the earliest
of these three inspired the other two. Frederick L. Collins*
Money Town, a book on Wall Street published in 1946 by
G. P. Putnam's Sons, retells the tale on p. 277; and George

THE LEGEND BECOMES ACCEPTED FACT 117

Seldes mentions it once more on p. 88 of One Thousand
Americans, brought out by Boni & Gaer, N. Y., in 1948.

Reviews of the first edition of The Hall Carbine Affair
appeared in a number of the historical quarterlies: by
Thomas C. Cochran in The Mississippi Valley Historical
Review, June 1945 J by Chester McA. Destler in The Journal
of Economic History, November 1945; and finally by
Stanley Pargellis in The American Historical Review, Jan-
uary 1946. Henrietta M. Larson in the Harvard Bminess
Review, spring issue 1944, referred to the Hall carbine
episode in terms that revealed a familiarity with this work.

Legend, v. History

Gustavus Myers once wrote a true saying: 188

Legends drawn from antiquity arose at a time when written knowl-
edge was scarce* Yet the avalanche of books and the wide reading of
modem times provide us no guarantee against the growth of new
legends. Quite the contrary. The more widely error is published and
imbibed, the greater its claim to unquestioned acceptance.

Here is humor indeed ; is it unconscious ? For Myers in his
own experience with his Hall carbine legend illustrates the
truth of his warning.

Everyone is familiar with the category of literature
known as historical fiction, wherein the novelist recaptures
with more or less fidelity a past epoch and interweaves his
plot with the historical setting. There is another kind of
historical fiction, which could be called folk-history, the
conception of its past that a people weaves out of its own
vitals. This process of shaping and re-shaping folk-history
never ends* Thus, into the Old Testament the Jews, under
the guise of history, poured their racial personality and
aspirations. For many decades after our Revolutionary
War, that event was presented to American youngsters as
the climax to all history, giving to the world a chosen nation,
destined to lead all peoples in virtue and progress.

Today, as always, the popular conception of our recent
past is merely a reflection of emotional cravings. Where the
will to believe exists, the slightest pretext suffices. It would
be hard to find more barren soil for a legend about J. Pier-
pont Morgan than in the Civil War records of the Hall
carbine transaction; but the mere presence of his name in
the archives sufficed. It was the peg on which to hang a
tale expressing the marxist Idea of Morgan, symbol of
capitalism. The marxist outlook on life is cynical, and there-
fore credulous: anything is believable, if bad enough. If
Morgan the man does not fill the prescription, Morgan the
capitalistic ogre must be created.

Any historian deserving the name has a goal toward
which he always strives, though he may never reach it: to

118

LEGEND V. HISTORY 1 19

sift all the data, to eliminate the suppositions that are
incompatible with the record, and to establish a tenable
narrative. History is the study of what happened: legends
and folk-history are what people wish to believe happened.
History is characterised by largeness of spirit, by absence
of violent moralizing. Folk-history is saturated with moral-
izing; everything is Right or Wrong, Good or Bad. Facts
are forced to the heart's desire. In the marxist conception
of history the capitalist is a villain, and so the young
Morgan must be painted with villainous lineaments.

Books on capitalism, on "finance capitalism", on the
morals of big business, drop continuously from the presses.
There is an enormous output of allegedly factual studies of
the conduct of big business men. The writers, for the most
part, have had no experience in business, and have not
known personally either the kind of men or the world they
describe. They adjust the tale to a formula, forcing history
to the procrustean bed of all-embracing preconceptions.
For those familiar with the matter, these books are gro-
tesque, being fiction masquerading as history, like the Hall
carbine case. They tell more about their authors and
readers than about their subjects.

Not many decades ago, a group of scholars formulated
standards of research for American history that revolu-
tionized our conceptions of our country's origin. Perhaps
the time is coming when pseudo-research and easy repeti-
tion will no longer be accepted as adequate for the history
of industry and business.

NOTES

Ord. Rep.:

Stevens v. U.

Key to abbreviations:

House Invest: Report and Testimony of Select House Com-

mittee appointed to inquire into Govern-
ment Contracts. Published as House Re-
port No. 2, 37th Cong., 2nd Session. (Two
volumes)

Report, exhibits, and testimony of Commis-
sion on Ordnance Claims and Contracts.
Published as Sen. Ex, Doc. No. 72, 37th
Cong., 2nd Session.

Record in the case of Simon Stevens v.
United States, before the Court of Claims,
December term, 1866, No. 2524, The rec-
ord consists of claimant's petition, testi-
mony, claimant's brief, brief for the
United States, and the decision. The de-
cision is published in Cases Decided in
the Court of Claims, December term,
1866, vol. 2, reported by Nott & Hunt-
ington, pp. 95-103.

Report of the Joint Committee on the Con-
duct of the War, Part III, published as
vol. 4 of Sen. Report 108, 37th Cong., 3rd
Session.

Arms Purchase Rep.: Report on Purchase of Arms, Published as
House Ex. Doc, No. 67, 37th Cong., 2nd
Session.

Joint Com.:

(P- 3) Fort Sumter had surrendered after 34 hours of bombard-
ment without casualties. During a salute to the flag
after the surrender two Union men were mortally
wounded by the bursting of a Union gun. Harper's
Weekly, April 20, 1861, p. 247; Harper's New Monthly
Magazine, June 1861, p. 120.

2. (p. 4) House Invest, vol. i,
1563-4-

pp. 189-201; 659-664; vol. 2, pp.

122 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

3. (p. 6) For details of Ripley's life, see eulogistic account in

Biographical Register of the Officers and Graduates of
the U. S. Military Academy, 1802-1890, by Bvt. Major
General George "W. Cullum, vol. i, No. 102, p. 119. Rip-
ley apparently became Chief of Ordnance on April 3,
1861, but took charge of the Ordnance Bureau in Wash-
ington on April 23. See also Congressional Globe,
April 29, 1862, p. 1870; Official Records of the War of
the Rebellion, Series III, vol. i, p. 102.

4. (p. 6) House Invest, vol. i, p. 235.

5. (p. 6) Ibid., pp. 235, 239.

6. (p. 6) Ord. Rep., p. 475.

7. (p. 7) House Invest, vol. i, p. 42.

B. (p. 7) Ibid., pp. 235-240; Ord Rep., pp. 482-4.

9' (P* 7) For text of correspondence, see Ord. Rep. t pp. 461, 474-5;

also printed in Stevens v. 17. ., Testimony, pp. 33-36.
10 * (P* 9> Congressional Globe, March 4, 1862, p. 1062.

" (P- 9) Official Records of the War of the Rebellion, Series III,
vol. i, p. 231.

12. (p. 9) Ord, Rep., p. 491.

13. (p. 10) Congressional Globe, April 29, 1862, p. 1870; Appendix,

37th^ Cong., 2nd Session, pp. 134-5. Cameron, after
leaving the War Department, said the appointment of
Ripley had been a mistake, because he proved "un-
equal to the crisis." See New York Herald, May 8,

l862, p. 2.

14. (p. 10) Arms Purchase Rep., p. 29.

15- (p. 10) Annual Report of Secretary of War, Dec. i, jgfo, Sen.
Ex. Doc. No. i, 37th Cong., 2nd Session, p. 5.

16. (p. 10) House Invest, vol. i, p. 200.

17- (p. 10) Arms Purchase Rep., pp. 29-31,

18, (p. 10) There is some evidence that the Hall carbines were not
the only arms sold by Ripley in June 1861. He ap-
pears to have disposed of 10,000 muskets to Colonel
Colt of New York, taking pistols in exchange. Hagner
seems to have succeeded in rescinding this contract,
with the consent of Colt, Congressional Globe, Appen-
dix, 37th Cong., 2nd Session, p. 135; House Invest.,
vol. i, p. 239.

19- (p. ix) House Invest, vol. i, pp. 239, 240.

KOTES 123

20. (p. u) Ibid., pp. 236, 237.

21. (p. n) Stevens v. 17. S., Testimony, pp. n, 12; House Invest., vol.

i, pp. 244, 245.

22. (p. n) #cm$<? Invest., vol. i, pp. 236, 244, 245; Stevens v. U. .

Testimony, p. 14.

23. (p. 12) Stevens v. 17. S., Testimony, pp. u, 12.

24. (p. 12) Stevens v. 7. 5., Testimony, p. 12; for text of contract,

p. 15; also, Ord. Rep., pp. 469-70.

25* (p. 13) Stevens testified under oath that Eastman "knew noth-
ing of my correspondence with General Fremont/*
Stevens v. U. S., Testimony, p. 10. Eastman testified
to the same effect. Ord. Rep., p. 482. The testimony
only confirms the necessities of the situation. Stevens
in dealing with a stranger was not going to disclose
the identity of a prospective buyer, as Eastman might
have approached Fremont direct.

26. (p. 13) For text of the telegrams, see Stevens v. U. S., Claim-
ant's Brief, pp. 1-4; also, Testimony, pp. 69-71.

2 7- (P- 13) Joint Com., pp. 48-9:

Question by Mr. Gooch: Did you know the charac-
ter of that weapon at the
time you purchased it, or
the history of it?

Answer by Gen. Fremont: I supposed it to be the

usual Hall carbine which
I had used in a journey
overland on one occa-
sion.

Question: You were familiar with

it?

Answer: Yes, sir.

The arm that Gen. Fremont had used had been made
to order for him, according to his testimony on a later
occasion. Stevens v. 7. 5,, Testimony, p. 62:

General Fremont: I had previously used one

of Hall's rifled carbines,
but this was one made
with unusual care, and
was certainly superior
to the common weapon.
It was made for me and
presented to me.

* 2 4 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

2 7- (p. 13) Though made to order, the arm that Fremont had
(cont) carried probably antedated the adoption of North's

improvement, and therefore was of an earlier model,
inferior in this respect to the batch that Stevens was
interested in. General Fremont in his testimony be-
fore the Joint Committee, supra, showed unf amiliarity
with North's improvement.

28. (p. 15) For facts in this and succeeding paragraph, see Allan
Kevins, Fremont, especially vol. 2 of first edition, p.
534; New York Tribune, June 29, 1861; Nicolay and
Hay, Abraham Lincoln, vol. 4; Major Hagner's testi-
mony, House Invest, vol. i, pp. 189-91; General Fre-
mont's testimony, Joint Com., pp. 3-5, 32 et seq.
(Fremont spoke of 23,000 stands of arms, but Major
Hagner in his testimony referred not once but thrice to
27,000 stands. Clearly reliance is to be placed on the
ordnance officer's precise mind rather than on the rec-
ollection of Fremont, whose virtues did not include
factual accuracy. The discrepancy is immaterial, and
is mentioned now only because a reviewer of the ftrst
edition of this book, in "spot-checking" the reliability
of its footnotes, found them accurate except as to the
stands of arms here referred to. He had chanced on
Fremont's testimony and had missed Hagner's. In
correspondence with the author the reviewer graciously
accepted the correction.)

2 9- (p- 15) Congressional Globe, March 4, 1862, p. 1069.

30. (p. 15) Eastman's testimony does not eliminate the possibility

that he was apprised of the destination of the arms
on Aug. 7, but the likelier interpretation is that he
learned of Fremont's purchase only when it became
common gossip in the market. Home Invest., vol. i,
p. 238; also, 243, 248. Stevens v. U. S. t Testimony, p. 10.

31. (p. 16) Ord. Rep., pp. 476, 483; House Invest., vol. i, pp. 245,

656-8; Stevens v. U. S., Testimony, p. 9.

32. (p. 17) Ord. Rep., p. 479.

33- (P- 18) House Invest., vol. i, pp. 239-240, 244.

34* (P- 18) Ord. Rep., p. 482; Home Invest., vol. i, p. 245.

35- (P- 18) Ord. Rep. t p, 479.

36. (p. 19) House Invest., vol. i, pp. 191-2.

37. (p. 19) Congressional Globe, 37 th Cong., 2nd Session, Appendix,

p. 13*.

NOTES 125

38. (p. 19) House Invest., vol. i, p. 940.

39. (p. 19) Ibid., pp. 245-8; for termination of Stevens's service

as aide-de-camp various dates appear in the record.
Stevens, House Invest., vol. i, p. 248, says September
21 ; elsewhere he and Fremont say September 26 (Ord.
Rep., p. 462; Stevens's memorial to House of Repre-
sentatives, dated February 10, 1862, published in The
Daily Tribune, May 2, 1862). We use September 20
because on that day Fremont's staff officers were listed
in General Order No. 15 and Stevens's name does not
appear. House Invest., vol. i, p. 1045.

40. (p. 20) Ord. Rep., pp. 465, 470-3; Stevens v. V. S., Testimony,

p. 1 6. The destruction of the Marston plant was one
of the dramatic episodes of the draft riots of 1863.

41. (p. 20) Ord. Rep., p. 479.

42. (p. 20) House Invest., vol. i, pp. 235-6, 656; vol. 2, p. 512; Ord.

Rep., p. 479; Stevens v. 17. S., Testimony, pp. 5-6.

43. (p. 21) House Invest., vol. i, pp. 237, 655-6,

44. (p. 21) Ibid., pp. 655-656; vol. 2, p. 513; Ord. Rep., p. 473.

45. (p. 21 ) Stevens v. U. S., Testimony, pp. 9, 25; House Invest., vol.

I, P- 237; VOl. 2, p. 5!5.

46. (p. 22) Stevens v. U. S., Testimony, pp. 6-7; House Invest., vol.

i, p. 245.

47. (p. 22) Ord. Rep., p. 472.

48. (p. 22) Interest on $20,000 at 7% for 38 days (Aug. 7 to Sept.

14) is $147-78; the advances were somewhat higher
than $20,000, to pay for alterations, insurance, etc.

49. (p. 22) House Invest., vol. 2, p. 514.

50. (p. 22) American Annual Cyclopaedia, 1861, pp. 298-9.

51. (p. 23) It will be recalled that Eastman had contracted to buy

all the Hall carbines in the Government arsenals, and
that he had expected to receive more than 6,000. Apart
from the 5,000 sold to Fremont, all he received were
400 inferior guns at the Frankford Arsenal. There
seems to have been a sale of some of these to Stevens,
and they may have been included with the others in
the arrangement with Morgan. The amount of the
commission $5,400 suggests that they were. It is
clear that they, as well as the 5,000 bought by Fre-
mont, were security for Ketchum's advances. The
additional 400 guns were undergoing repairs in Mars-
ton's shop in early October, long after the Fremont
arms had reached St. Louis. The ultimate fate of
these 400 guns is unknown. Ord R$p. t pp. 474, 483;
House Invest., vol. x, pp. 236, 660, 671.

126 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

52. (p. 23) House Invest,^ vol. i, p. 659.

53. (p. 23) Ibid., p. 245.

54. (p. 24) Ibid., p. 657; vol. 2, pp. 515 et seq.; Stevens v. 17. S.,

Testimony, pp. 13, 25.

55. (p. 26) House Invest., testimony of Captain Callender, vol. i,

pp. 624, 868, 936-40; testimony of Captain Turnley, pp.

56* (p. 26) Arms Purchase Rep., pp. 26-7.

57, (p. 27) House Invest., vol. i, p. 662.

58, (p. 27) Congressional Olobe, March 4, 1862, p. 1070.

59, (p. 28) George Opdyke v, Thurlow Weed, transcript of testimony

published by American News Co., 1865, p. 61.

60* (p. 28) John Raymond Howard: Remembrance of Things Past,
1925, PP- 36-7, 40, 52, 70, 133, 138, 142-3, 152* 158.

61. (p. 29) Stevens v, 17. S*, Claimant's Petition, p. 5; Testimony,

p. 25; House Invest., vol. 2, p. 515.

62. (p. 29) Fremont in his telegram of Aug. 6 asked that the arms

be sent by express, and said he would pay "all extra
charges." See p. 13.

63. (p- 30) For testimony and exhibits relating to the appendages

and packing boxes, see House Invest., vol. i, p. 939;
Ord* Rep., pp. 478, 480, 483; Stevens v, U. S., Testi-
mony, pp. 19-20.

64. (p. 32) This includes $1,000 for packing boxes, of which $500

appeared in Voucher No. i, and the balance in Voucher
No, 2.

65- (p. 34) House Invest., vol. i, p, 939. The correct and incorrect
forms of Vouchers No. i and No. 2 are scattered
throughout the official records. For Voucher No. i val-
idly executed, see Arms Purchase Rep., p. 27; Stevens
v. 7. S.> Testimony, p. 5. For Voucher No. i in defec-
tive form, see House Invest., vol. i, pp. 49, 937. For
Voucher No. 2 validly executed, see Ord. Rep., p. 460;
Stevens v, 17. &, Testimony, p. 6. For Voucher No. 2
in draft form, see House Invest., voL i, pp. 49, 938;
Ord. Rep., p, 484.

66* (p. 34) House Invest., voL i, p. 939.

67. (p. 34) Stevens v. U. S*, Testimony, pp. 7, 22-23.

68. (p. 34) /oid, p. 23.

NOTES 127

69- (p. 34) House Invest., vol. 2, p. 516; Stevens v, U. S., Testimony,
pp. 22-23.

70. (p. 34) Stevens v. U. S., Testimony, p. 7.

71. (p. 35) Ord. Rep., p. 494.

72. (p. 35) Arms Purchase Rep., pp. 22-3.

73- (P* 35) New York Daily Tribune, Sept. 26, 1861; DaiZs/ Missouri

Democrat, same date.

74- (P. 36) For testimony of these men, see House Invest, vol. i.

75- (P- 36) Stevens v. U". S., Claimant's Petition, p. 8.

76. (p. 36) Official Records of the War of the Rebellion, Series I,

vol. 3, p. 532.

77. (p. 36) It would be an imposition to ask the reader to pick his

way through the intricacies of the Voucher maze. But
for the connoisseur in the Hall carbine affair, the dis-
entangling of deliberate tergiversation from honest
misunderstanding is an absorbing pastime. As will
be seen in the next section of the narrative, it is un-
necessary to question the good faith of the Congres-
sional committee. They knew Voucher No. i only in its
unauthorized form, which they had no reason to sus-
pect; and they drew the permissible conclusion that it
placed Stevens in the role of agent. Conversely, it is
impossible not to question the good faith of the War
Department's investigators; they had in their posses-
sion both forms of Voucher No. 2, but in their report
they chose to deny the existence of the genuine one,
thus leaving Stevens no instrument on which to base
his claim.

The report of the War Department commission was pub-
lished on July i, 1862. On July n, The New-York
Times summarized its conclusions editorially, charac-
terizing the Hall carbine episode as "the most ex-
traordinary operation, by all odds, that marked the
period of contract-snatching*'. In the issue of July
12 Simon Stevens replied in a lengthy letter, in the
course of which he accused the Congressional com-
mittee of having forged Voucher No. i, so that the
words "by me" were made to read "by my order".
This accusation overlooks the existence of the un-
authorized form of Voucher No. i, and as Stevens had
nothing to gain by falsely accusing the Congressional
committee of bad faith, it seems that he was himself
ignorant of the existence of the tentative voucher re-
ceipted by Howard on Morgan's behalf.

128 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

77* (P- 36) In Ms letter Stevens went on to accuse the War De-
(cont.) partment commission of "falsification" in denying the

existence of an authentic Voucher No. 2. "This cer-
tificate, attached to the bill", he wrote, "was delivered
to the Department last October, and is now, I am as-
sured, on the files of the Department. By what means
or with what motive this certificate has been concealed,
I leave to others to conjecture."

The Sunday Dispatch on July 13 carried an editorial ex-
coriating Stevens. The Daily Tribune on July 14
reprinted Stevens's letter from The New-York Times,
and in an editorial note drew attention to the gravity
of his charge that the Congressional committee had
been guilty of forgery. On July 19 The Tribune pub-
lished a reply from the secretary of the committee,
Theodore F. Andrews, in which he stated that he had
in his possession the voucher whose existence Stevens
denied. Andrews, of course, was right. If he knew
of the irregularity of that voucher, and of the ex-
istence of an authentic form, he did not let on. On
the same day The Tribune pointed out editorially that
an alternative form of the voucher had been published
by the Government. (The Tribune writer said, erro-
neously, that the Ordnance Commission had published
it; it had appeared, in fact, in an entirely different
document, a report on arms purchases submitted to
the House of Representatives by the Secretary of
War on March 3, i$6z, and printed as House Ex. Doc.
67, 37th Congress, and Session, p. 27.) The Tribune
editorial concluded with this sentence: "We do not
like to have our confidence thus shaken in the au-
thenticity of Public Documents."

On July 24 The Tribune published a letter from Robert
Dale Owen, of the War Department commission. He
pointed out that two forms of Voucher No. i existed,
and that his commission had accepted the authenticity
of the one which showed Fremont had bought the
arms from Stevens. But this letter of Owen's failed
to deal with Stevens's allegation that the War De-
partment commission had suppressed Voucher No. 2.

7& (p. 37) House Invest, voL x, pp. 40-52, 136.

NOTES 129

79- (P- 38) Ibid., pp. 40-41. The Committee made a good story better
by alleging that 790 of Eastman's carbines had been
purchased by the Government in April, 1861, at $15
each:

". . . . the case as to these would stand thus : They are
condemned and sold by the government at a merely
nominal price; afterwards, in April last, an agent of
the War Department purchases them for the govern-
ment at $15 each; in June they are sold to Eastman
by the War Department for $3.50 each, and in August
they are purchased by General Fremont for the gov-
ernment at $22 each."

The Committee were in error. It is true that the 790
arms in question had been bought by the Govern-
ment, but not by the Ordnance Department, and they
did not figure in the batch delivered to Eastman. At
the time of the Baltimore riots, the War Department
had appointed one Alexander Cummings to serve as
a special purchasing agent, and among other things
he had bought 790 Hall carbines for $15 each in the
New York market. Ripley testified that the Ordnance
Bureau had no knowledge of these guns. Ibid., vol. 2,
p. 168. Cummings testified that the supplies bought
by him were dispatched directly to the scene of fight-
ing. Ibid., vol. i, p. 408.

Senator Trumbull in Congress on Jan. 14, 1862, repeated
the Committee's comments about the 790 carbines, be-
ing unfamiliar apparently with Ripley's intervening
testimony. Carl Sandburg in his Abraham Lincoln:
the War Years, vol. i, p. 427, quotes Trumbull, ap-
parently not knowing that Trumbull was quoting from
an official report and that the report had been cor-
rected by Ripley's later testimony.

80. (P- 39) House Invest., vol. i, p. 43.

81. (p. 39) MM; p. 41.

82. (p. 39) Ibid., p. 42,

83- (P- 39) Ibid., pp. 42-52.

84. (p. 40) Ibid., pp. 44, 656. Representative Holman of the Com-
mittee in presenting the Stevens transaction to the
House on April 29, 1862, during the debate on the
Committee's resolution, persisted in the error. Con-
gressional Globe, 37th Cong., 2nd Session, Appendix,
p, 136.

!30 THE HALL. CARBINE AFFAIR

85. (p. 40) House Invest., vol. i, pp. 51-2.

86. (p. 40) Ibid,, p. 136.

87. (p. 41) Ibid., p. 52.

88. (p. 4*) Ord Rep,, p. 462.

89. (p. 42) New For& D<w7^ Tribune, July 24, 1862: letter from

Robert Bale Owen. The House Committee itself laid
so little store by their own argument that in the de-
bate on their resolution Rep. Dawes of the Committee
said he did not "care a copper" if the wording was
amended so as to read that Fremont had bought the
arms from Stevens. Congressional Globe, April 29,
1863, p. 1869.

90. (p. 42} House Invest., vol. 2, pp. 512-19.

91. (p. 42) Ibid., pp. Mv-lxxvi.

92. (p. 43) For references to newspaper articles dealing with the

Hall carbine transaction, see Bibliography, pp. 149-151.

93- (P- 43) For text, see New York Daily Tribune, May 2, 1862.

94. (p. 43) First published in The World, Feb. 19, 1862; Joint Com.,

p. 40.

95. (p. 43) Congressional Globe, April 28, 1862, p. 1851.

96. (p. 43) Ibid-, P- 1887.

97. (p. 44) Ibid., Appendix, 37th Cong., 2nd Session, p. 136. For

references in House debates to the Hall carbine epi-
sode, see Bibliography, p. 149.

98. (p, 45) Orel Rep., pp. 2-3.

99. (p. 45) Ibid., p. 13.

100. (p. 46) Report of the Commission on the Hall carbine case con-

sists of exhibits and testimony (pp. 460-485), and
findings (pp. 485-495)-

101. (p. 46) The claim as presented to the Ordnance Commission is

expressly referred to as having been "presented by
Messrs. Ketchum, Son & Company" in Stevens v.
U. S., Claimant's Petition, p. 8.

102. (p. 46) Ord. Rep., p. 464.

103. (p. 47) Ibid., pp. 462-3, 473.

NOTES 131

104. (p. 47) Ibid., p. 464.
105- (P. 47) Mid., pp. 464-8.

106. (p. 47) Ibid., pp. 468-473-

107. (p. 47) Ibid., pp. 479-80, 482-84,

108. (p. 47) N, Y. Evening Post, May 7; Daily National Intelligencer,

June 5, 1862.

109. (p. 50) For paragraph quoted in text, see Ord, Rep., p. 494 ; for

Voucher No. 2 in complete form, p. 460; for the
"form" of Voucher No. 2 of which the commission
spoke, ibid., p. 484. See also note 77. Voucher No. 2
in both forms is reproduced facing p. 34,

no. (p. 50) Stevens v. U. S., Claimant's Petition, pp. 9-10.

11 * (P- 5i) The facts in this paragraph come from the record of
the case on file with the Court of Claims, Stevens v.
the United States, No. 2524.

112. (p. 52) The case was heard before four judges; Peck, J., deliv-
ered the opinion, in which Casey and Knott con-
curred; Loring dissented without an opinion,

113- (p. 52) For the decision of the Court of Claims, see Nott &
Huntington, Cases Decided in the Court of Claims of
the United States, December Term, 1866, vol. 2, pp.
95-103.

"4- (P- 53) This quotation and the one that follows it are taken
from a letter printed below, from Assistant Attorney
General Ashton to the Secretary of War, written on
August xi, 1868. Authority for the statements about
the disposition of the case is to be found in docu-
ments that the War Department, the Treasury, and
the Department of Justice have generously made
available from their files. The payment to Stevens
was mentioned in the annual report of the Secretary
of the Treasury for 1868-9, pp. 324-5.

The following two letters, not hitherto available to the
public, have particular interest for the light they shed
on the attitude of the War Department and the De-
partment of Justice in 1868 to the Stevens claim, It
win be noted that in the second letter, the Assistant
Attorney General twice refers to the Court of Claims
decision as having been unanimous; in the light of
Judge Loring's dissent, these references are not clear.

132 THE HALL CAKBINE AFFAIR

x*

114. (p. 53) War Department

(cont.) Washington City

g. , July 29th, 1868

On the 29th nit., I had the honor to address a com-
munication to the Honorable O. H. Browning, Acting
Attorney General, in reference to a suit now on ap-
peal in the Supreme Court from the Court of Claims,
in which the United States is appellant and Mr,
Simon Stevens, appellee. The appeal was taken at
the request of the late Secretary of War, Mr. Stanton.
It was arranged that the case should he called up at
the last term by stipulation of counsel, but the ar-
rangement was not carried into effect.

Mr. Stevens requests of the Secretary of War, that
the matter be referred to Mr. Solicitor Norton and
Mr. Trumbull, special counsel, to consider whether,
under the circumstances, in justice to the appellee, the
appeal should not be withdrawn without delay. In
my letter of the 29th ult. to Mr. Browning, I re-
quested him to take the subject into consideration,
and, after conferring with Mr. Norton and Judge
Trumbull, to advise me whether, upon the whole case,
the appeal taken by the Government is well founded
and can be prosecuted with any reasonable prospect
of success.

Mr. Browning's reply of the 2nd of July, informed
me that the solicitors who had theretofore conducted
the litigation of the government in the Court of
Claims, under an act taking effect on the ist instant,
were disabled from official duty by abolition of their
offices, and that it was inconvenient for him to make
himself officially acquainted with the case. He deemed
it expedient to suspend action in the premises until
there was time enough to appoint indispensable pub-
lic officers.

The object of this communication, then, is to bring
the matter again to the attention of the Attorney
General's office, and further to suggest that, should
it be inconvenient to you to give personal attention to
the case, I should be happy to accept the opinion,
upon the point brought forward, of such of your as-
sistants as you may designate for that purpose.
Very respectfully,

Your obedient servant,
(signed) J. M. Schofield

To Secretary of War,

Hon. William M. Evarts >
Attorney General

NOTES 133

114. (p. 53) Attorney General's Office

(cont.) August nth 1868

Hon. Jno. M. Schofield
Secretary of War

Sir:

The Attorney General, under the intimation con-
tained in your letter of the 29th ult. has referred to
me for my consideration and opinion the subject of
the Appeal of the United States from the judgment
of the Court of Claims in the case of Simon Stevens.

I am clearly of opinion, after a very careful exam-
ination of the record, that the whole duty of the Ex-
ecutive Department of the Government was performed
when the case was referred to the judicial determina-
tion of the Court of Claims, and, in view of the thor-
ough examination which was made by that Court into
the validity and good faith of the transaction, and
the actual value of the arms furnished by Mr. Stevens,
and of the unanimous opinion of the Judges in favor
of the claim, that a further prosecution of the litiga-
tion by the Government operated, and still continues
to operate, as a hardship upon the claimant to which
a just Government ought not to subject any one of its
citizens.

I concede that the case was a proper one originally
for judicial scrutiny, though it is difficult to believe
that the facts before the War Department, at the
time the matter was under consideration, did not war-
rant and would not have fully justified the payment
of the claim; but, after the Government had received
the benefit of an exhaustive contestation of the case,
after all the circumstances out of which the contract
arose, and all the facts attending it, had been fully
disclosed by the witnesses familiar with them, upon
examination and cross-examination, after an extended
consideration of the case by counsel in argument not
only as presented by the testimony in the particular
cause but as affected by other and similar cases grow-
ing out of the administration of the Department of
the West by General Fremont, and, finally, after a
pure and learned tribunal of the Government's own
selection had pronounced in favor of the validity and
meritorious character of the claim, and unanimously

134 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

114. (p. 53) concurred in recommending its payment, I apprehend
(cont.) that no duty remained to the Government but to pay

the claim, and thus perform, what was, at best, at
that time, but tardy justice.

No embarrassment in reference to the dismissal of
the appeal arises, or need arise, from any of the cir-
cumstances under which it was taken. I am informed
that it was not directed by your predecessor as the
result of any previous examination of the grounds of
the decree of the Court of Claims, that it was taken
against the well-instructed judgment of all the Solici-
tors of the United States, and that no consideration
of the expediency or propriety of the appeal was pre-
viously had by the Attorney General.

The question may, therefore, be considered by your
Department as if it were now, for the first time pre-
sented; and, so considering it, I am free to say, that,
as a measure of further precaution, the appeal is
both unnecessary and inexpedient.

Upon the general proposition whether the Supreme
Court will accept the precise view of the authority of
General Fremont adopted by the Court of Claims, I
express no opinion, for that is a matter which can-
not be foreknown; nor do I think it proper, perhaps,
to give an opinion upon the question how far General
Fr&nont had power to bind the United States by con-
tract, for such an opinion may affect other cases yet
undetermined.

Nor are such expressions of opinion at all necessary
in the present situation of the case; as, in my judg-
ment, the propriety of your consenting to a dismissal
of the appeal, depends upon the other considerations
to which I have briefly invited your attention.

I have the honor to be
Very respectfully
Your obedient servant
(signed) J. Hubley Ashton

Assistant Attorney General

"5 (P- 54) Mason v. U. , 6 Ct, CL 57 (1870).

"* (P- 55) See affidavit of Edward Savage, the manufacturer, Ord.
#P-t p. 467 > also, for collateral information about
this particular batch of steel-barreled carbines, see
Fuller, Claud E., The Breech-loader in the Service,
pp. 43 ff.

NOTES 135

117. (p. 55) A carbine is a short gun adapted for cavalry and other

short-range use. A musket was the customary arm
for infantry; it commonly took the name of rifle after
the universal adoption of rifled barrels. A musketoon
was an arm intermediate in length between a carbine
and a musket.

See affidavit of W. W. Marston, who altered 4,000 of
the arms, Ord. Rep., pp. 465-6, also, of Austin Bald-
win, former Government inspector, ibid., pp. 467-8;
also, Stevens v. U. S., Testimony, pp. n, 17-18.

1 1 8. (p. 55) For Stevens's testimony on this, see Stevens v. 27. S.,

Testimony, p. 12; for Eastman's, House Invest., vol. i,
p. 236; for Fremont's, Joint Com,, p. 40. Marston
was explicit as to the 4,000 arms that he had altered:
Ord. Rep., pp. 465-6; also, Stevens v. U. S., Testimony,
pp. 16-19; also House Invest., vol. i, p. 671.

In the entire record and contemporary discussion of the
case, there is only one hint that anyone with author-
ity to speak questioned the condition of any of the
lot of 5,000 carbines. The Ordnance Commission, who
never saw the arms, said in their report that "more
than 4,000 had not been in service", and this might
suggest doubt about the balance. The Commission
may have had in mind the allegation (erroneous, as
it turned out) as to 790 of the carbines made by the
House Invest. Com. (see note 79, supra), combined
with the fact that the Massachusetts machinist who
altered 1,000 of the arms did not testify as to them.
But there is no reason to believe that the arms sent
to Massachusetts for alteration differed from the rest.
Possibly the Commission also had in mind another de-
tail; Whiteley delivered to Eastman only 4,996 guns,
whereas 5,000 were delivered to Fremont; the odd four
may have been used rifles. Owing to the inadequacy
of the Ordnance Commission's digest of the evidence
in the Hall carbine case, it is rash to give much
weight to it when not supported by other evidence.

**9- (P- 55) An account of Fremont's embarrassments, including
protests of troops against arms supplied to them, ap-
peared in the Missouri Daily Democrat, October 4,
iS6x. See also General Ulysses S. Grant's testimony,
House Invest, vol. 2, p. i ; Capt. Granger's testimony,
tWL, voL i, pp. 629-630; also, testimony of other offi-
cers, ibid., vol. 2, pp.

136 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

120. {p, 55) Stevens v. U. S., Testimony, p. 62; Joint Com., pp. 48-9.
Fremont left the Western Department only a month
after the troops received the carbines, and therefore
his testimony might not be conclusive.

Major Hagner solicited a report on the record of the
carbines from Lt. H. R. Buffington of the St. Louis
arsenal, and the latter submitted a general statement,
dated May 15, 1862, covering the record of all Hall
arms used in the Western Department since June
1 86 1. He said in part: "In the early period of the
war officers complained of these arms, but for many
months they are only too willing to use them, as no
others have been and apparently cannot be supplied,
but the impression is, among those who know and
those who do not know, that this arm is very inferior
to Sharpens carbine." Ord. Rep. t p. 476. He made no
mention of extraordinary complaints about the arms,
which presumably he would have done if there had
been any.

Captain Gordon Granger, in command of the St. Louis
Arsenal, while unfamiliar with the gun, had previ-
ously testified, on Oct. 19, 1861, that soldiers with
their lives at stake and out to win a battle would nat-
urally choose a Sharps' or Maynard's carbine in pref-
erence to a HalFs, but that the workmanship of the
HalFs carbine seemed good and the arrangement for
loading convenient. House Invest,, vol. i, pp. 630-1.

Information as to the performance of the batch of guns
bought from Stevens is fragmentary. According to
Col. L C. ("Ike") Woods, of Fremont's staff, they
reached St. Louis when "we had no other arms for
our cavalry. The ad Illinois cavalry regiment were
supplied entirely with HalPs carbines; four compa-
nies of Kansas cavalry were supplied with them, as
were other regiments; and 500 of them were sent to
General Pope, in North Missouri, to be issued to home
guards there. They were issued very quickly after
their receipt, and we had no other arms for cavalry
to take their place." Joint Com., pp. 198-9.

A small item in the Missouri Daily Democrat of August
31, 1861, announced the arrival of "forty boxes of car-
bines, weighing nine thousand pounds". This referred
undoubtedly to an instalment of 800 of Stevens's arms.

A friend of Fremont's, Representative Shanks of Indi-
ana, reported on the floor of the House that Stevens's
batch of carbines gave a good account of themselves

NOTES 137

120. (p. 55) at the battle of Pea Kidge on March 7-8, 1862. Con~
(cent.) gressional Globe, April 28, 1862, p. 1851. The last we

hear of them is in July 1862, when Stevens said that
they were in service in the Department of Mississippi.
The New-York Times, July 12, 1862.
There is one further reference that is worth citing 1 .
William Forse Scott in a book of reminiscences, pub-
lished in 1893, The Story of a Cavalry Regiment; the
Career of the Fourth Iowa Veteran Volunteers, speaks
of Hall carbines, though there is no reason to identify
them with the ones that Stevens handled. But his
recollection of the arm places it well, both as to its
defects and the attitude of the troops toward it:

"It was about this time [1863] that carbines were
first issued to the regiment. Only forty could be ob-
tained, and they were divided among several com-
panies. They were 'HalP carbines, an inferior gun
of short range, taking a paper cartridge; but they
were breechloaders, and their coming was a thing of
great interest to the men. Those who did not receive
them envied those who did. It was soon found, how-
ever, to be a distinction not altogether desirable; the
carbine men were called to the front whenever there
was a fight on hand."

121. (p. 56) The following is the appraisal of Hall's arm made by a

leading modern authority on the history of fire-arms,
Claud E. Fuller:

"When the present day student of military firearms
refers to one or more of the very complete histories
on the subject now available, he at once becomes im-
pressed with the great achievement of John H. Hall,
the inventor of the first breech-loading firearm regu-
larly adopted by any nation/* [Fuller, op. ctt., p. 17.]
And again:

"The Hall arm represents an outstanding achieve-
ment in the development of firearms not only because
it was the first breech-loader adopted by any govern-
ment, but that its construction was undertaken under
the interchangeable system which at that time was
considered as presenting too many obstacles to ever
be successfully accomplished.

"Hall succeeded in developing the system to a point
of perfection unsurpassed by even the modern methods
of today, and considering the handicaps of working
with the crude machines of the time, manually oper-
ated or at the best driven by water power, his work
is deserving of the greatest credit.** [Fuller, op. cit-,
preface]

138 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

122. (p. 56) Fuller, op. cit., p. 26; House Rep. 375, 34th Cong., ist

Session, pp. 4 et seq.

123. (p. 56) Fuller, op. cit*, p. 51.

124. (p. 56) Ibid., p. 42. This is not the place to embark on the con-

troversy as to priority in making small-arms with
replaceable parts. The evidence seems to indicate
that Eli Whitney was first, with Captain Hall and
Colonel North running neck and neck for second place.
Fuller publishes considerable material on this sub-
ject. See also the New York Herald Tribune, edi-
torial on "Connecticut Genius", Oct. 10, 1935.

12$. (p. 57) House Invest., vol. i, p. 660: "... I had always liked the
principle of the gun as a breech-loader the advan-
tage, in. my mind, being that the cartridge is intro-
duced in front of its seat instead of behind it. I
stated, however, that the mechanism of the gun, and
the old plan of loading it, had, no doubt, caused its
rejection as a breech-loader.* 7

126. (p. 57) Ord. Rep*, p. 490. Lt. Buffington in his report on Hall's
arms in the Western Department (note 120, supra)
said that 18 guns had been sent in with broken stocks.
"The general condition of these arms," he went on,
"as they come from the field for repair, would indicate
a great escape of gas through joints, and the resid-
uum of powder left interfering materially with the
efficient working of the receiver." Buffington's report
does not say how many of HalPs arms were in use in
the Western Department, and there is no way to com-
pare the foregoing figures with the breakage occur-
ring to other models in the hard western campaign
of 1861-2.

I2 7* (P* 5?) Ord. Rep., p. 490. In 1837, when the Hall patent was
already standard equipment in the army, the Hall
arm was subjected to competitive tests with three
experimental models of breechloaders. One of the
latter, known as the Cochran, was criticised by the
examining board as "highly dangerous both to the
bearer and to others in contiguous positions", and in
the course of the tests one accident actually occurred.
(See Senate Report 15, 2sth Cong., ist Session, p. 9.)
Is it possible that the person who wrote the Ordnance
Commission's report, probably Major Hagner, had
this very mishap in mind but by a slip of memory
laid it to the Hall arm?

NOTES 139

128. (p. 58) See bibliography for general references to the Hall car-

bine.

129. (p. 58) Norton, Charles B., American Breech-Loading Small

Arms, p. 12; Sawyer, Charles Winthrop, Firearms in
American History, vol. Ill, pp* 136-9.

130- (? 58) Fuller, op. cit. t p. 29; also printed in House Rep. 375,
24th Cong:., ist Session, pp. 4-5, with some discrepan-
cies in the text.

i3i' (p. 59) Fuller, op. cit. t p. 35.

132- (P 59) Ibid., p. 66.

133- (P* 60) Senate Ex. Doc. 79, 3 3rd Cong., 2nd Session, p. 356*
134. (p. 60) Ord. Rep., pp. 473-4; 475-

i3S- (P 60) Joint Com., p. 40.

136. (p. 61) House Rep. 85, s6th Cong., 2nd Session. The Floyd
controversy evoked voluminous discussion. As the
documents relating to the "condemnation" of ordnance
stores in 1857 have never heretofore been assembled,
and some of them never even published, they will be
set forth herein;

i.

The following is the statute defining the powers of the
Secretary of War to sell stores, taken from Statutes
of the United States, vol. iv., p. 127:

An Act to authorize the sale of unserviceable ord-
nance, arms, and military stores.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Repre~
sentatives of the United States of America, in Con-
gress assembled, That the President of the United
States be, and he is hereby, authorised to cause to be
sold any ordnance, arms, ammunition or other mili-
tary stores, or subsistence, or medical supplies, which,
upon proper inspection or survey, shall appear to be
damaged, or otherwise unsuitable for the public ser-
vice, whenever, in his opinion, the sale of such unser-
viceable stores will be advantageous to the public
service.

Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That the inspec-
tion or survey of the unserviceable stores shall be
made by an inspector general, or such other officer or
officers as the Secretary of War may appoint for that
purpose; and the sales shall be made tinder such rules
and regulations as may be prescribed by the Secre-
tary of War.

Approved, March 3, 1825.

140 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

136. (p. fix) According to Ripley, Ordnance Department regulations,
(cont.) parts 94-6 of the edition of 1852, provided that all

condemned stores should be sold at public auction;
but if the prices offered were not deemed satisfactory
they could be bid in, and could afterwards be sold at
private sale for prices not less than were offered for
them at auction. (Ord. Rep.> p. 473.)

On August ii, 1857, Secretary Floyd addressed the fol-
lowing communication to the Ordnance Bureau:

The Colonel of Ordnance is requested to report the
number of muskets and other small arms on hand
which have been made into percussion arms by alter-
ation from the old flintlock, and where they are; also
as to the expediency of selling such arms or a portion
of them, and applying the proceeds of sale to the
procurement of arms of the present improved model;
also, whether there are any field guns or Howitzers,
or mortars of old patterns, or otherwise unsuitable
for the service, which it may be advisable to sell, and
where they are.

(Signed) John B. Floyd

Secretary of War
War Department
n Aug. 1857.

The foregoing was found in the Old Records Office of
the War Department, among Orders and Endorse-
ments, BBNO. 7, entered on August 12, 1857, No. 524.

3.
Colonel Craig's reply, dated August 14, 1857, follows:

Ordnance Ofl&ee
Washington, August 14., 1857
Sir:

I have the honor to inclose herewith a tabular state-
ment showing the number of muskets and other small-
arms altered from flint-lock to percussion, which are
on hand at the different arsenals, and the number of
such arms at each; also the number and description
of field guns, howitzers and mortars (exclusive of
trophy and experimental pieces) which are unsuitable
for service, and where they are. This statement fur-
nishes, it is believed, the information called for by
your letter of the nth instant

NOTES 141

136. (p. 61) As respects the expediency of selling tlie altered
(cont.) percussion small-arms or any portion of them, con-

cerning which I am requested also to report, the
measure is in my opinion inexpedient at present. The
number of small-arms (all rifled) of the latest model
is very small, about 3,000; their fabrication at the
armories has but just begun, and not more than one
thousand per month can be calculated upon being
turned out for a year to come, judging from the very
slow progress since the change of model. The original
percussion arms (not altered) on hand at the arsenals
are about 250,000 muskets, 56,000 rifles, 18,000 pistols,
in all 324,000. If all the altered arms are sold, it will
leave on hand a supply of about 327,000 small-arms
only. I think that the stock on hand should not be
less than one million, and that until it reaches that
number by additional manufacture at the armories,
no arms that can be made serviceable on an emer-
gency, as all the altered arms reported in the state-
ment can be, should be sold. If offered for sale in
large quantities they will not probably command a
price nearly equal to their cost or intrinsic value, and
the government will sustain a pecuniary loss by such
sale. If the sale of small-arms is confined to such as
may, on inspection, be condemned as damaged and not
worth repair, there can be no objection to it, either
on the ground of a diminution of the available stock
or of pecuniary loss. Such is the case with the field
guns, howitzers, and mortars embraced in the state-
ment.

The commanding officers of the different arsenals
and ordnance depots will be called on to furnish lists
of the field guns, howitzers, and mortars which may
be sold as unsuitable for the public service, and of
the damaged small-arms and other ordnance stores
not worth repairs, which lists will be submitted to
you for the purpose of obtaining authority to sell.

Bespectfully, etc.,

H. K. Craig,
Colonel of Ordnance.
Hon. John B. Floyd,
Secretary of War.

The foregoing was published by Bene"t, Brig. Gen.
Stephen V., A Collection of Annual Reports and Other
Important Papers, relating to the Ordnance Depart'
ment, w>L II. pp. 612-3.

142 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

136. (p. 61) Floyd's reply of August 18, 1857, follows:
(cont.) I disagree with the views of the Colonel of Ord-

nance relative to the sale of altered percussion mus-
kets; with a supply of 327,000 percussion arms, not
altered, which, are added to at the rate of 1000 arms
every month of the best model, there is no ground for
fear of an inadequate supply of arms, and therefore
affords no reason against a sale of the altered arms.
As to the inadequacy of the price likely to be offered
now, it is certain the evil will be greater and greater
as the clumsy arm becomes more and more antiquated.
The Commanding Officer will be directed to include
in the lists to be furnished, in addition to the articles
enumerated by CoL Craig, the altered arms; and in-
structions as to the sale of them, or a part of them,
will be given after the lists are received and examined.

John B. Floyd
Sec. of War
War Department
18 Aug. 1857

The foregoing was found in the Old Records Office of
the War Department, among Orders and Endorse-
ments, BBNO. 7, entered on August 18, 1857, No. 538.

5-

Colonel Craig thereupon sent the following communica-
tion to the commanding officers of all arsenals :

Ordnance Office, Washington, August 25, 1857.
Sir: By direction of the Secretary of War, you are
designated to inspect the field-guns, howitzers, mor-
tars, and altered percussion arms included in the
annexed statement, or such of them as may be now at
your post. Also, any other field-guns, howitzers, mor-
tars, or small arms on hand, (exclusive of trophy and
experimental pieces,) which may be damaged or other-
wise unsuitable for the public service.

You will forward to this office an inspection inven-
tory, according to form n Army Regulations, with
full remarks and recommendations, and duplicate lists
according to form 10 same regulations.
Respectfully, etc.,

H. K. Craig,
Colonel of Ordnance.
To Commanding Officers of Arsenals.
Published in OrdL Rep., p. 475.

NOTES 143

6.

136. (p. 61) When on November 5, 1857, Colonel Craig duly submitted
(cont.) the list of arms to Secretary Floyd, he accompanied

it with this endorsement:

Ordnance Department,
November 5, 1857

Respectfully submitted to the Secretary of War,
with the recommendation that the property named in
the above list be sold, with the exception of such of
the brass guns as are trophies, gifts of foreign na-
tions, and single samples of old models, and all the
altered muskets that are fit for service. These mus-
kets would be perfectly serviceable in a struggle with
a foreign nation, and are now distributed advanta-
geously to meet such a crisis; their storage costs noth-
ing, and their preservation but a trifling sum. By
being thrown into the market in mass at this time,
there would be a very great sacrifice. I would, there-
fore, respectfully suggest that these arms should be
disposed of periodically, say, by annual sales, com-
mencing with the third or most inferior class, each
sale to consist of a number equal to double the amount
of the annual accumulation of muskets in the arsenals
by the manufacture of those of the model of 1855. By
this mode of procedure we would gradually rid the
service and our arsenals of old-model arms without
reducing our store much below the dictates of pru-
dence.

The accompanying reports of the inspecting officers,
numbered i to 17 in red ink, will exhibit in detail the
condition of the property referred to.

H. K. Craig,
Colonel of Ordnance.

The foregoing was published by Bene"t, op. dt., p. 628.
The lists of arms mentioned have not been found.

7-

Our next and concluding document raises a question
that it does not answer. Prom 1857 to 1860 Ripley
was Inspector of Arsenals. In the Old Records Office
of the War Department, among "Orders and Endorse-
ments'*, BB No. 9, Oct. i, 1859 Sept, xS, 1860, is to be

144 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

136 (p. 61) found the following endorsement, bearing the identi-
(cont.) fication numbers o 149 and 4360:

Nov. 7, 1859: Submits list of Ordnance & Ord.
Stores condemned at the New York Arsenal by Lt.
Col. J. W. Ripiey, 4 Nov. recommends that they be
disposed of.

Approved. J. B. Floyd

Secretary of War.

War Department
7 Nov. 1859

The list mentioned in the endorsement has not been
found. Prom this endorsement it would appear that
Ripley himself drew up a list of ordnance stores at
Governor's Island in 1859, which he recommended for
sale. Why did he not mention this list when the Hall
carbine affair broke? Perhaps it did not include the
carbines, which would have been embarrassing. But
if it did, Ripley's embarrassment might have been
equally great, for then the undivided responsibility
for condemning and selling the arms would have
rested on him, who as Inspector of Arsenals origi-
nally put them on the list and who later, as Chief of
Ordnance, actually sold them.

137. (p. 6a) Ord. Rep. t pp. 473, 476-7.

138. (p. 62) House Invest., vol. 2, p. 167.

*39- (P- 63) 6*ff*t Congressional Globe, March 4, 1862, pp. 1062-3.

140. (p. 63) Arms Purchase Rep., pp. S, 18. Ripley 's bureau bought

444 Sharps* at $35 each on August 16, 1861; it placed
contracts for 6,000 Sharps' at $30 on June 29 (before
Bull Kun), for 10,000 Smith's at $32.50 on August 27;
and for 7,500 Burnside's at $35 on August 27.

141. (p. 63) Joint Com., p. 40: "After they had been rifled and other-

wise improved, I purchased them at $22. Taking into
consideration the advance in price of arms caused by
the war, I submit that the purchase is not deserving
of special censure." Also, Stevens v, U. S. t Testi-
wwny, PP- 68-69: ". . . the arms purchased from the
claimant as testified to were worth to me in the ex-
ecution of my duties and to the service of the country
at that time all that I agreed to pay for them."

NOTES 145

142. (p. 64) The record contains much testimony that is either imma-

terial or partisan on the value of the carbines. The
Ordnance Commission paid attention to prices re-
ceived for Hall carbines in the spring of iS6i. (Ord.
Rep., p. 490.) Those prices had been established be-
fore the Battle of Bull Eun affected the arms market;
furthermore, nothing is known about the condition
and type of the carbines involved.

Stevens and Ketchum introduced into evidence before
the Ordnance Commission and later in the Court of
Claims the opinions of various experts. (Ord. Rep. t
pp. 480-2; Stevens v. U. S. f Testimony, pp. 28-32.)

For Hagner's appraisal, see House Invest., vol. i, p. 659.
Capt. Gordon Granger thought the carbines were
worth between $12 and $15; ibid., p. 630.

Contemporaries did not notice that Ripley's own bureau,
on August 16, 1861, bought 1,575 HalFs rifled muskets
at $15 each, and 920 HalFs carbines at $9 each. Noth-
ing is known as to their condition. (Arms Purchase
Rep., pp. 4, 8.) Throughout the duration of the Civil
War, the Ordnance Bureau under Ripley and his suc-
cessor appears to have bought 3,520 Hall carbines for
a total sum of $64,763.50, or more than ?i8 each. (Ful-
ler, p. 226, op. tit.) These would not include, of course,
the ones bought by Fremont or by Cummings.

It would be easy to multiply quotations from contem-
poraries about Stevens's carbines, but we have con-
fined ourself to persons who spoke with knowledge of
the transaction and the gun.

143. (p. 65) House Invest., vol. i, p. 236.

144. (p. 65) Ibid., p. 655 et seq
145- (P- 65) Ibid., pp. 244-5.

146. (p. 66) For sources of information about Stevens, see bibliog-
raphy.

i47* (P- &6) To his dying day Simon Stevens seems to have been re-
garded by many persons as nephew or kinsman of
Thaddeus Stevens, The latter, however, was explicit
on this point: **...! will say that Simon Stevens is
in no way, even in the most remote degree, any kin-
dred of mine." He went on to identify Simon: "He
is a constituent of mine, I knew his father [Henry

146 THE HALL CAKBINE AFFAIR

147. (p. 66) Stevens the antiquarian] when I was very young, in
(cont.) Vermont. He is still living, and as intelligent and

honorable a man as that noble state has ever pro-
duced. His son came to Pennsylvania to seek his for-
tune long after I came there; not to the same county,
but I went to the county where he resided. His char-
acter, where he is known, stands as fair as that of
any member of this House except the Committee Ian
ironical allusion to the House committee that was in-
vestigating government contracts]. He has never
been charged or impeached with fraud until now.
. . . Whatever I may be, he is a gentleman of high
character and standing." Congressional Globe, April
28, 1862, p. 1851.

148. (p. 68) House Invest., vol. i, p. 656; vol. 2, p, 513; Ord Rep.>

P. 473-

149. (p* 69) There is perhaps one clue to the identity of Stevens's

associates, but it remains unsolved. Stevens's ar-
rangement with Ketchum called for the acceptance by
the latter of a $12,000 draft in favor of one Jacob
Griel, payable only when Ketchum would be in funds
from the arms. (See Ketchum J s statement of his ac-
count with Stevens, opposite page 42; for other ref-
erences to Griel's interest, see Stevens v, U. S., Claim-
ant's Petition, p. 7; Testimony, p. 7; House Invest.,
vol. 2, p. 515.) It seems a reasonable guess that
Jacob Griel was Stevens's mysterious partner, or the
cover for his partner or partners. No one asked
Stevens who Griel was, and the record gives no hint.
Somewhere in the archives of those days details about
him may yet be found, and the explanation for the
$12,000 draft cleared up.

In 1861 Stevens still regarded himself as a resident of
Pennsylvania, and it is worth noting that Simon
Cameron, the Secretary of War who had approved
the sale of the carbines to Eastman, was the undis-
puted political boss of Pennsylvania. Cameron's part
in the transaction may well have made it appear safer
to Stevens when he got into it. Stevens's first ques-
tion, when he learned the surprising news that the
carbines were on Governor's Island, was whether
Cameron had approved the sale. It is not known
what Stevens's relations with Cameron were. Cam*
eron and Thaddeus Stevens at this moment appear to
have been politically estranged, a reconciliation being
effected somewhat later.

NOTES 147

149. (p. 69) For Opdyke's connections with the arms market and
(cent) Marston, see Opdyke v. W eed. f op. cit. For Opdyke's

presence in Washington on January 22, 1862, see House
Invest., vol. 2, p. 513.

150. (p. 82) The New York Times, March i, 1934; Nov. 12, 1935.

151. (p. 82) New York Herald Tribune, Books, March 4, 1934.

152. (p. 82) The New York Times, Oct. 28, 1936.

i53 (p* 82) New York Herald Tribune, Books, Jan. 17, 1937.
154. (p. 82) Publishers' Note, History of the Great American For-
tunes, by Gustavus Myers, published in The Modern
Library by Random House, Inc., 1936, pp. 7-8.

*55' (P- 89) For Hartley's testimony, see House Invest., voL 2, pp.
199-204; the claim of his firm, Schuyler, Hartley &
Graham, against the Government was Case No. 70
handled by the Commission on Ordnance Claims and
Contracts; see Ord, Rep., pp. 295-6.
156. (p. 90) Myers, Gustavus, America Strikes Back, New York,

1935, P- viL

157- (P* 9) New York Herald Tribune, Books, Jan. 17, 1937.
158. (p. 93) The New York Times, Dec. u, 1935.
i59 (P- 93) House Invest., vol. i, p. 630. Captain Granger was testi-
fying:

Question: What is the effect of putting such guns [the

Austrian muskets] into the hands of soldiers?

Answer: You can tell from the fact that I had to put

1,000 men under arrest all night to force them

to take them.

Question: How did they feel about it?
Answer: They seemed very much discouraged. . , , I
have overheard them talking about the gun,
and have frequently heard remarks to the
effect that they much rather be in front of
the guns than behind them.

The next question concerned the Hall carbines, so that
the remark about the Austrian muskets was juxta-
posed to the inquiry about Hall carbines.

i6a (p. 94) For the identity of "Corey", see Benjamin Gitlow, / Cow-
fess, Button, 1939, especially pp. 323-4, 388; also House
Report 2277, 77th Cong., 2nd Session, pp. 5-6,
For contemporary press references to Louis C. Fraina,
see N. Y. Herald, Oct. 23, 1917; N. Y. World, Feb. 10,
1918; N. Y, American, Feb. 10 and , 1918; and N. Y.
World, March 26, 1919. See also Washington dispatch
about Lewis Corey in N. Y. American, Jan. 14, 1935.

148 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

161. (p. 105) Reprinted in Congressional Record, 6tfh Cong., 2nd Ses-

sion, Part 6 (Appendix and Index), p. 388.

162. (p. 107) Redder Than the Rose, Covici, Friede, Inc., 1935* PP-

112-3.

163. (p. 109) Senator Long's radio address was published in Con-

gressional Record, March 4, 1935, 74th Cong., ist Ses-
sion, pp. 3024-5, Appendix,

164. (p. no) Published by W. W. Norton, Inc., New York, 1934; pp.

298-9.

165. (p. no) In the edition published by William Heinemann, Ltd., in

PP 463-4-

1 66. (p. in) Introduction to Merchants of Death, supra, p. viiL

167. (p. 112) Published by George Routledge & Sons, Ltd., 1936; p.

139=

"Among other big business magnates, the old John
Pierpont Morgan won his spurs during the struggle,
and this by carrying on a trade in arms that was
more than questionable. Acting in concert with a cer-
tain Mr. Stevens, he bought in the North 5000 carbines
which were reported unfit for further use, paying for
them 3% dollars apiece. These he sold for 22 dollars
each to General Fremont of St. Louis in this war
the generals having to procure their own arms. Later,
when payment became due, the military authorities
protested, but Morgan went to law and won his case
in the court of first instance and again on appeal.
On this deal his net profit was not far short of 100,000
dollars. 1

m Gustavus Myers, Geschichte der grossen ameri-
kanischen Vermogen. Berlin 1923, vol. ii, p. 538."

Also, p. 220:

"The magnates of big business, who during the
second half of the nineteenth century attained the sum-
mits of plutocracy, had nearly all laid the foundations
of their fortunes during the Civil War. We have
already seen how John Pierpont Morgan at the age of
twenty-four started his traffic in arms, buying and
selling old rMes at a profit of 500%,"

168. (p. 1 18) Myers, Gustavus, America Strikes Back, p. vii

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The following list of sources includes only material with a direct
bearing on the Hall carbine case.

I. PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SOURCES:

1. Simon Stevens v. United States, suit decided by the Court
of Claims in the December term, 1866, The decision appears in
vol. 2 of the reports of Nott & Huntington, pp. 95-10$. In the
files of the Court of Claims are preserved (a) the claimant's
petition; (b) 72 pages of testimony of witnesses; (c) claimant's
brief; (d) brief of the United States; and (e) a number of
miscellaneous papers in manuscript, all of which have been
examined.

2. Report, exhibits, and testimony of the Commission on
Ordnance Claims and Contracts, sometimes called the Commis-
sion on Ordnance and Ordnance Stores; published as Sen. Ex.
Doc. No. 72, 37th Cong., znd Session, especially pp. 460-495.

3. Reports and testimony of Select Home Committee ap-
pointed to inquire into Government Contracts; published as
House Report No. 2, 37th Cong., 2nd Session, two volumes.
Especially the testimony of Major P. V. Hagner (vol. i, pp.
189-201, 659-664; vol. 2, pp. 1563-4) ; Arthur M. Eastman (vol. i,
pp. 235-240) ; Simon Stevens (vol. i, pp. 242-248) ; Captain
Franklin D. Callender (vol. i, 620-625; 868-9; 936-940); Gordon
Granger (vol. i, pp. 628-631) ; Morris Ketchurn (vol. i, pp. 655-
659; vol 2, pp. 512-519); William M. Marston (vol. i, pp. 670-
673) J Captain Parmenas T. Turnley (vol. i, pp. 919-920) ; Gen.
James W. Ripley (vol. 2, pp. 167-8) ; Marcellus Hartley (vol. 2,
pp. 199-204) ; and William J, Syms (vol. 2, pp. 209-210).

4. The testimony of General John C. Fremont and Colonel
I. C. Woods before the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the
War, appearing in Part III (which deals with the Department
of the West) of the Committee's report. The Committee's report
was published as Sen. Rep. 108, 37th Cong., jrd Session.

5. General Ripley's Report on Purchase of Arms, published
as House Ex. Doc. No. 67, 37th Cong., 2nd Session.

6. Miscellaneous letters and documents relating to the Hall
carbine affair in the files of the War Department, the Depart-
ment of Justice, and the Treasury, which the officials of those
departments generously allowed to be photostated,

7. Discussion of the Hall carbine case in the contemporary
newspapers and the Conffresmonal Globe. All the files of con-

150 THE HALL CAEBINE AFFAIR

temporary daily newspapers of general circulation in New York
and Washington to be found in the New York Public Library
and the Library of Congress were searched, as well as the con-
temporary files of the Daily Missouri Democrat. The following
is a tabulation of the items discovered;
1861

Aug. 31 Daily Missouri Democrat: news item
Sept. 26 New-York Tribune: Wash, dispatch; Mo. Democrat:
Wash, dispatch

27 Tribune: letter, editorial

28 Times: item

Oct. i Tribune: editorial note; N. Y. Commercial Adver~

tiser: editorial note
a Mo. Democrat: editorial; Wash, dispatch

4 Mo. Democrat: item

5 New York Evening Post: item; Washington Eve-

ning Star: editorial note; Mo. Democrat: edi-
torial; Tribune: editorial

7 Mo. Democrat: item

8 New York Herald: Cairo, 111., dispatch
20 Herald: Alton, 111,, dispatch

Nov. 8 N. F, Commercial Advertiser: editorial

Dec. 17 Congressional Globe: p. 116

1 8 Herald: news item
1862

Jan* i Tribune: editorial

14 Cong. Globe: pp. 308-9

Feb. 8 Tribune: Wash, dispatch; N. F. Evening Express:
Wash, dispatch; Times: Wash, dispatch

9 Herald: editorial

19 The World: item

25 National Republican (Washington) : editorial note

Mar. 4 Tribune: news item; Cong. Globe: pp. 1062-3, 1071

8 Mo. Democrat: item

18 Tribune: news item

Apr. 25 Cong. Globe: pp, 1035, 1037-8

28 Cong. Globe: pp. 1848, 1849, 1851

29 Cong, Globe: pp, 1868-70; Appendix: p. 136

30 Cong. Globe: pp. 1887-88; Tribune: editorial note
May 2 Tribune: Stevens letter, editorial note

3 Tribune: editorial

4 N. Y. Sunday Dispatch: editorial
7 Evening Post: letter

22 Daily National Intelligencer (Washington) : Ripley
letter

BIBLIOGRAPHY 151

June 5 Daily National Intelligencer; letter

July ii Times: editorial

12 Times: Stevens letter

13 Sunday Dispatch: editorial

14 Tribune: editorial note and Stevens letter

19 Tribune: letter and editorial

20 Sunday Dispatch: editorial
24 Tribune: letter

1867

May 7 World: Court decision; Daily National Intelli-
gencer: Court decision
13 Times: Wash, dispatch

8. The Hall carbine affair has been discussed briefly in two
monographs dealing with special phases of Civil War history,
Meneely, A. Howard: The War Department, 1861, New York,
Columbia University Press, 1928, pp. 274-5; an <i Shannon, Fred
Albert: The Organization and Administration of the Union
Army, 1861-1865, Cleveland, The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1928,
pp. 58-61, 120-1. Both writers, who touch on the episode only
incidentally, are materially wrong in their facts.

IL PEINCIPAL APOCRYPHAL ACCOUNTS:

1. Myers, Gustavus: History of the Great American Fortunes,

vol. III., Chicago, Charles H. Kerr & Company, 1910, pp.
170-176; reprinted by the Random House, Inc., in The
Modern Library, in 1936, in one volume, pp. 548-552.

2. Corey, Lewis: The House of Morgan, New York, G* Howard

Watt, 1930; pp. 57-63.

3. WInkler, John K.: Morgan the Magnificent, New York, The

Vanguard Press, 1930; pp. 56-57.

4. Josephson, Matthew: The Robber Barons, New York, Har-

court, Brace and Company, 1934; pp. 59-62-

5. Engelbrecht, H. C., and Hanighen, F. C.: Merchants of

Death, New York, Dodd, Mead <fe Company, 1934; PP- 59-6*.

6. Seldes, George: Iron, Mood and Profits, New York, Harper

& Brothers, 1934; pp* 227-8.

III. INFORMATION ABOUT THE HALL CARBINE:

Of general works on the history of small arms that treat
the Hall carbine, one of the most useful is Claud E. Fuller's
The Breech-loader in the Service, Topeka, The Arms Reference
Club of America (F. Theodore Dexter, business secretary? 9*o
Jefferson St., Topeka, Kan.), 1933, through page 52. Excellent
text and illustrations will also be found in Notes on United

152 THE HALL CARBINE AFFAIR

States Ordnance, by Capt James E. Hicks, Vol. i, Small Arms
1776-1940, published in 1940 by the author, 428 Rich Avenue,
Mount Vernon, N. Y, Also see Sawyer, Charles Winthrop:
Firearms in American History, vol. Ill, Our Rifles, Boston, The
Cornhill Company, 1920, illustration opp. page 21, pp. 25, 109,
136-9, 223-5; a l s Norton, Charles B., American Breech-loading
Small Arms, New York, F. W. Christern, 1872, pp. 10-15; also
article by Thales L. Ames, Capt, John H. Hall: His Contribu-
twn to the Art of Arms, Army Ordnance, May-June, 1923.

For texts of official reports and documents relating to the
Hall arm, see Benet, Brig. Gen. Stephen V., A Collection of
Annual Reports and other Important Papers relating to the
Ordnance Department, Washington, Government Printing Office,
1880, pp. i, 4-5; also Senate Doc, 15, zsth Cong., ist Session,
being a report of a board of officers appointed to examine the
improvements in fire-arms made by Hall and others ; also Senate
Doc. 29 at the same session, relating to the same matter; also
House Rep. 375, 24th Cong., ist Session, dealing with a petition
of John H. Hall. Commodore M. C. Perry's reference to HalPs
arms appeared in his official narrative of his mission, which was
published as Senate Ex. Doc. 79, 33rd Cong., 2nd Session, see
P- 3S&*

IV. INFORMATION ABOUT SIMON STEVENS:

The official record of the Hall carbine case has almost no
information about Stevens. In his testimony before the House
investigating committee he identified his brother Henry as the
London book dealer, and Thaddeus Stevens in the debate in the
House of Representatives on April 28, 1862, (Cong. Globe, 37th
Cong., 2nd Session, p. 1851) gave some facts about him. For
his connection with the New York customs house contract, see
(i) his testimony before the House investigating committee, vol.
2, pp. 1536-7; (2) House Ex. Doc. No. 107, 37th Cong,, 2nd
Session; and (3) the third installment of the Report of the
House investigation committee, published as House Reports 49
and 50, 37th Cong., srd Session. The foregoing reports and the
testimony before the House investigating committee of Hagner,
Eastman, and Marston, shed considerable light on his person-
ality. Additional information about his relations with General
Fremont is to be found in the testimony in the libel suit of
George Opdyke v. Thurlow Weed, published in 1865 by the Amer-
ican News Company; see also the interview with Stevens pub-
lished in The New-York Times, on the occasion of Fremont's
death, July 28, 1890. General information about his life ap-
peared in Stevens's obituary notices, August 29, 1894, in the
Tribune, Times, World, Herald, Sun, and Evening Post. For

BIBLIOGRAPHY 153

information about his family, see the lives of his brothers Henry
and Benjamin Franklin published in the Dictionary of American
Biography; also, Recollections of James Lenox, by Henry
Stevens, and Memoir of Benjamin Franklin Stevens, by G. Man-
ville Fenn, privately printed by the Chiswick Press, London, in
1903. For information about his sister Sophia, Morgan's teacher,
see J. Pierpont Morgan: An Intimate Portrait, by Herbert L.
Satterlee, Macmillan, 1939. There is a wealth of information
about the family background and genealogy in Frederic Palmer
Wells's History of Barnet, Vermont, published in 1923 by the
Free Press Printing Co., Burlington, Vt.

APPENDIX I 155

HISTORY OF THE GREAT
AMERICAN FORTUNES

BY

GUSTAVUS MYERS

Atrraon or "THK RISTOKY OP TAMMANY HALL,"

rviuc ntAKCHtsis m w vow CITT." nc

VOL. III.
GREAT FORTUNES FROM RAILROADS

(CONTINUED)

CHICAGO

CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY
1910

156 APPENDIX I

I/O HISTORY OF THE GREAT AMERICAN FORTUNES

MORGAN'S FIRST STROKE OF BUSINESS.

J. Pierpont Morgan's first ascertainable business trans-
action was in one of these army contracts ; and while it
was not on so large a scale as those of older capitalists,
it was (judged by prevailing capitalist standards) a very
able stroke for a young man of twenty-four. Its success
gave promise of much greater things to come, in which
respect Morgan's admirers were not disappointed,

In 1857 the army inspecting officers condemned a
large number of Hall's carbines as thoroughly unservice*
able, and as of obsolete and dangerous pattern. The
Government thereupon auctioned off quantities of them
from time to time at prices ranging from between $c and
$2 each. Five thousand of them, however, still remained
in the army arsenal in New York City and were there
when the Civil War broke out*

On May 28, 1861, one Arthur M. Eastman, of Man-
chester, New Hampshire, made an offer to the Govern*
ment to buy these rifles at $3 each. Knowing the great
frauds going on in the furnishing of army supplies, the
Government officials might well have been suspicious of
this offer, but apparently did not question its good faith*
The rifles were sold to Eastman at $3.50 each. But
either Eastman lacked the money for payment, or had
been thrust forward to act as a dummy for a principal
in the background One Simon Stevens u then stepped

"The House Investigating Committee on Government Con-

APPENDIX I 157

j, FIERPONT MORGAN'S GENESIS

on the scene, agreeing to back Eastman to the extent of
$20,000, which sum was to be applied for payment for the
rifles ; as collateral security Stevens took a lien upon the
rifles. But from whom did Stevens get the funds?
The official and legal records show that it was from J.
Pierpont Morgan.

A GREAT SCANDAL OF THE TIME.

The next step in this transaction was in Stevens* tele-
graphing, on August 5, 1861, a notification to General
Fremont, commanding at St. Louis, that he had five thou-
sand new carbines, in perfect condition, and inquiring
whether Fremont would take them. From Fremont's
headquarters came word to ship them to the army head-
quarters at St. Louis at once. During all of this time
the carbines had remained at the arsenal in New York
City. Upon receiving Fremont's order, Morgan paid the
Government the sum of $17,486 at the rate of $3.50
a carbine. The rifles were shipped direct from the
arsenal to St. Louis. And what was the sum charged
upon the Government for them? The bill made out to

tracts in 1862 reported to Congress that Simon Stevens was one
of a clique involved in custom-house frauds. Before i8S9t the
New York Collector of the Port had employed the laborers and
cartmen in the appraiser*^ store to haul goods to the Govern-
ment bonded warehouses. In August, 1859, Collector Schell (a
corrupt Tammany politician) made a contract by which the haul-
ing was turned over to some of his political associates* They
were paid $123,000 a year. "Upon this contract," reported
Chairman Van Wyck, "the parties made from fifty to seventy-
five thousand dollars yearly. 1 ' The committee showed how the
contract had been corruptly obtained, and stated that Stevens
had a one-eighth share of the profits. Stevens also caused any
of the custom-house clerks who said anything against the con-
tract to be removed from office. The Congressional Globe,
Third Session, Thirty-seventh Congress, 1862-63, Part II, Appen-
dix :ii8.

158 APPENDIX I

172 HISTORY OF THE GREAT AMERICAN FOBTUNES

Fremont called for the payment of $22 apiece for the
consignment. 15

This was one of the many army contracts popularly
and officially regarded as scandalous in the highest de-
gree; one of the select Congressional Committees of 1862
lost no time in the investigating of it. After making a
full inquiry this committee reported:

Thus the proposal actually was to sell to the Government at
$22 each 5,000 of its own arms, the intention being, if the offer
was accepted, to obtain these arms from the Government at $3.50
each, * . . It is very evident that the very funds with which
this purchase was effected were borrowed on the faith of the
previous agreement to sell. The Government not only sold one
day for $17,486 arms which it had agreed the day before to

i* Reports of Committees, Second Session, Thirty-seventh
Congress, 1861-62, Vol. ii : Ixiv-Ixxli.

The frauds at Fremont's headquarters, at St Louis, were
particularly enormous. Major McKinstry, quartermaster of the
U. S, army at that place, was tried by a courtmartial on sixty-
one specifications of corrupt practices, and was found guilty on
twenty-six. The testimony showed the grossest frauds, by col-
lusion, in all kinds of army supplies. f The Morgan rifle trans-
action, however, was not brought out in the specifications. Mc-
Kinstry was discharged from the army. House Reports, Com-
mittees and Court of Claims, Third Session, Thirty-seventh Con-
gress, 1^62-63, Report No. 49: 1-24.

That the bribery of certain Union officers was a fact was re-
vealed by this communication sent by Major-General Frederick
Steele, on July 26, 1864, from Little Rock, Ark,, to Major-
General E. R. S. Canby, commanding the Military Division of
West Mississippi:

"General: Your communication in regard to bribery among
the officers of my command is just received. If bribes had been
taken it must have been by agents. I am satisfied that the of-
ficers know -nothing about it. General Marcy, Inspector-General,
is at Fort Smith investigating the matter. Carr is chief-quar-
termaster of my corps and a lieutenant-colonel. Brig.-Gen. J.
W. Davidson has slandered Carr on all occasions. ... He
could have had affidavits in regard to the corruption of his own
disbursing officers if lie had wished them, I have seen such
affidavits/' House Miscellaneous Documents, Second Session,
Fifty-second Congress, 1892-93 (Rebellion Record Series I Vol.
xli), p. 4W.

APPENDIX I 159

J. PIERFONT MORGAN'S GENESIS 173

reparchase for $109,912 making a loss to the United States
of $92,426 but virtually furnished the money to pay itself the
Ct7,486* which it received.

The committee further reported that the rifles were
so bad that it was found that they would shoot off the
tfiumbs of the very soldiers using them. But not only
did the Government condemn the transaction as a bare-
laced swindle; Marcellus Hartley, himself a dealer in
arms and a self-confessed swindler, had declared before
the committee, "I think the worst thing this Govern-
ment has been swindled upon has been these confounded
Hairs carbines." 10 The Government refused to pay
Morgan the $22 demanded for each of the five thousand
carbines, whereupon Morgan pressed his claim. Thus
it was that the case of J, Pierpont Morgan vs. The United
States Government came into the public records. If
figured as case No. 97." To adjudicate this claim, as
well as many other similar claims, the Secretary of War
appointed a Commission composed of J* Holt and Rob-
ert Dale Owen, son of the famous Robert Owen*

Reporting on July I, 1862, this commission stated that
one hundred and four cases, involving demands ttpon.
the National Treasury to the extent of $50,000,000 had
been referred to it, and that it had cut out $17,000,000
of claims as extravagant and fraudulent. 1 * In passing
upon Morgan's claim it declared that General Fremont
had no authority to contract for the rifles, but that it,
the committee, recognized a legal obligation on the part
of the Government arising from the fact that the arms
passed into the service of the army. As the best way
out of a bad bargain it decided to pay Morgan at the

ie Reports of Committees, Second Session, Thirty-seventh
Congress, 1861-62, VoL 1:200-204.
** Ibid., 64-72.
** Ibid*. Ixxvii

160 APPENDIX I

174 HISTORY OF THE GREAT AMERICAN FORTUNES

rate of $13.31 a carbine, and it pointed out that even at
this price Morgan and Stevens stood to make $49,000
above the price at which the rifles had been sold to them
by the United States. 19 Under this ruling a total of
$55,550 was paid to Morgan by the Government, which
sum was accepted on account only:

This settlement, however, was not satisfactory to the
claimants ; the full pound of blood was demanded. Suit
was brought in the Court of Claims at Washington for
$58,000 more. This time the case was entitled Simon
Stevens vs. The United States Government. 20 In the
settlement of the case before the court the fact was
emphasized that, according to the Government, the car-
bines had been inspected and pronounced unserviceable
by the Government ordnance officer. In delivering his
decision Judge Peck said : " By an arrangement between
Stevens and one J* Pierpont Morgan the voucher for the
first two thousand and five hundred carbines delivered
was to be made out in the name of Morgan, which was
done ; the said voucher was signed by F. D. Cadwallader,
Captain of Ordnance, United States Army, and was for
the sum of $55,550. By further arrangement this
voucher went into the hands of Messrs. Ketchum, Son
and Company." This voucher was paid on or about
September 10, 1861. The other twenty-five hundred
rifles, the court said, had also been received by Fre-
mont. 21

19 Ibid, Ixxv. The Commission stated that there was a legal
obligation on the part of the Government to pay, but that this
obligation arose not from Fremont's contract, but because the
arms did pass into army service.

20 Court of Claims Reports, ii : 98, etc.

21 Ibid., 99. In arguing for the Government the U. S. Assist-
ant Solicitor said to the court:

"The arms were purchased by Arthur M. Eastman, from the
United States, at three and one-half dollars each, because they
had been inspected and pronounced unserviceable by the ord~

APPENDIX I 161

j* PIERPONT MORGAN'S GENESIS 175

These are the facts as set forth in tmimpassioned court
records.

COURTS MAKE THE GOVERNMENT PAY.

Did Morgan and his associates get their full demands
from the Government ? They did. Judge Peck held that
when Fremont had agreed to buy the rifles he had en-
tered into a contract which fround the Government, and
that a contract was a contract The court took no
cognizance of the fact that the worthless, condemned
rifles had been represented as new, nor did it consider
the fact that the money with which they had been
bought from the Government was virtually Government
money. It gave Stevens a judgment against the Govern-
ment for $58,175.

It was this particular decision which assured the open
sesame for the holders of what were then cynically called
" deadhorse claims " to collect the full amount of their
swindling operations. The Government could now
plead itself defenseless against the horde of contractors
who had bribed officials to accept decayed ships and de-
fective armor, worthless arms and shoddy clothing, flimsy
tents, blankets and shoes, and haversacks which came
to pieces, adulterated food and similar equipment and
supplies. As for criminal action, not a single one of
these defrauders went to prison, or stood any danger of
it ; the courts throughout the land were perennially busy
rushing off petty defrauders to imprisonment and em-
nance officer. They were sold by Eastman to the claimant for
twelve and one-hall dollars each, and the claimant at once sold
to General Fremont at twenty-two dollars each. The Govern-
ment price for new arms of this pattern, of good quality and
fit for service, was seventeen and one-half dollars." Ibid., 98.

1 62 APPENDIX I

176 HISTORY OF THE GREAT AMERICAN FORTUNES

ploying the full punitive power of their machinery
against poor, uninfluential offenders. 22

This was the real beginning of J. Pierpont Morgan's
business career; the facts are there immovable and un-
assailable in the public records. This was the brand of
*' patriot" he and his fellow capitalists were; yet ever
since, and especially so to-day, clergy and politicians and
shallow, obsequious writers saturate the public with myths
all designed to prove Morgan's measureless benevolence
and lofty patriotism. 2 *

22 In reporting to Congress, on March 3, 1863, the House Se-
lect Committee on Government Contracts, after submitting its
great amount of testimony regarding the frauds on every hand,
concluded :

44 Many frauds have been exposed, the Government relieved
from many unconscionable contracts, and millions of dollars
saved to the treasury. Yet it is a matter of regret that punish-
ment has not been meted out to the basest class of transgressors.
They to whom this duty belonged seemed sadly to have neglected
it. Worse than traitors in arms are the men pretending loyalty
to the flag, who^ feast and fatten on the misfortune of the na-
tion, while patriot blood is crimsoning the plains of the South,
and bodies of their countrymen are mouldering in the dust.
The leniency of the Government towards these men is a marvel
which the present cannot appreciate, and history never explain."
House Reports, Committees and Courts of Claims, Third Ses-
sion, Thirty-seventh Congress, 1862-6?. Report No. so : 47. But
history can explain. It was not to be expected that the very
class controlling Government the capitalist class was to be
proceeded against by its creature.

23 For example, an article entitled * f Cleveland's Opinion of
Men" in " McClure's Magazine," issue of April, 1909. The
writer of this article quotes Cleveland, for several terms Presi-
dent of the United States, as saying of Morgan's conduct when
a bond issue was under way in 1894:

" I saw, too, that with him it was not mereljr a matter of
business, but of clear sighted, far-seeing patriotism. He was
not looking for a personal bargain, but sat there, a great patriotic
banker, concerting with me and rny advisers as to measures to
avert a peril, determined to do his best in a severe and trying
crisis/*

APPENDIX II

THE HOUSE OF

MORGAN

A SOCIAL BIOGRAPHY OF THE
MASTERS OF MONEY

BY
LEWIS COREY

NEW YORK

G-HOWARD WATT- 1930

1 64 APPENDIX II

WAR-AND CARBINES 57

profit, William H. Vanderbilt farming, John D. Rockefeller
investing savings in an oil refinery, Andrew Carnegie in civilian
service, and Philip Armour speculating in pork (which he
sold "short" on the approach of Union victory, clearing
$2,000,000) . 2 The call "to make men free" did not thrill these
men, calculating the chances of becoming rich: others might
die but they must amass.

The son of Junius Morgan concentrated on business during
the war under the firm name of ]. Pierpont Morgan & Co,,
private bankers. On Exchange Place, in the shadow of the Wall
Street he was later to rule, the arrogant, massive youngster
plied his business, mostly foreign exchange. Nothing about
him attracted attention or indicated the coming master of
money (unless it was his concentration on business). Men
later tried to create an aura for the young Morgan, attributing
to him an "impressive" utterance: "We are going some day
to show ourselves to be the richest country in the world in
natural resources. It will be necessary to go to work, and to
work hard, to turn our resources into money to pay the cost
of the war just as soon as it is ended." 3 Which was neither
Jmpressivc nor original, being the common talk of the day.
Morgan was an up-and-coming youngster ploddingly engaged
in the banking business in a comparatively small way and pur-
suing the ordinary routine of making money, of which the war
was simply an aspect. In doing this and while awaiting the
rich future, J. Pierpont Morgan participated in a transaction
characterized by a committee of the House of Representatives
as fraudulent "an effort to obtain from the government some
$49,000 over and above the value of the property sold" and
"a crime against the public safety." 4

This transaction of Morgan's was Included among the war-
contract frauds revealing an extraordinarily low Jevel of busi-
ness morality. Six weeks after the war started the New York
*Tirnes declared that "very general and, we fear, well-grounded
complaints and apprehensions exist of great corruption and

APPENDIX II 165

58 THE HOUSE OF MORGAN

wastefulness in contracts for our Army and Navy." 8 The
House of Representatives immediately appointed a select com-
mittee to investigate, the chairman of which wrote privately
to Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase of an "organized
system of pillage . , * robbery* fraud, extravagance, peculation." *

The charges were amply proven by the facts. In the business
world speculation and profiteering flourished menacingly and
unashamed, multiplying the burdens of war and the chances
of disaster. While the lonely man in the White House (the
practical politician becoming great under tragic pressure) tried
to impose his dreams upon events and soldiers yielded their
full measure of devotion to the music of "As He died to make
men holy let us die to make men free," buccaneers in the
business community interpreted the mighty events of an epic
age in terms of profit and loss* The soul of the nation was not
in them but in the men who answered the call for volunteers,
singing as they marched, "We are coming, Father Abraham,
300,000 more" in these men and in the man who aroused
their devotion.

Profiteers swooped upon the government (in the North and
in the South). Systematic customs frauds prevailed, which
Secretary Chase reported had "been successfully carried on for
a series of years*" T A legion of traders in government patron-
age sprang up who, by corrupt political influence, secured
contracts which they sold to manufacturers at a large profit:
the manufacturers raised their prices accordingly, and a trifle
more* Fraud tainted much of the money paid by the govern-
ment on contracts and the balance was tainted by excessive
profits* The committee of the House of Representatives in
1862 reported large frauds in the purchase of ordnance and
stores, Treasury and War Department employees, contractors,
politicians and bankers conspiring to swindle the government.
"Profits from the sales of arms to the gevernment have been
enormous,** said the investigating committee, "and realized
by a system of brokerage as unprincipled and dishonest, as

1 66 APPENDIX II

WAR AND CARBINES 59

unfriendly to the success of the nation, as the plotting* of
actual treason." * Neither the investigation nor ousting of the
Secretary of War improved matters much, leading one Repre-
sentative in 1863 to say: "After the lapse of two years we find
the same system of extortion, frauds and peculation prevail-
ing." a The cry went up: "Corruption will ruin us!**

The investigating committee reported frauds in 104 cases
and refused payment of $17,000,000 out of $50,000,000 on con-
tracts, J. Pierpont Morgan appeared in a case as financing the
sale to the government of the government's own arms at an
extortionate profit. The facts are in the Congressional Re-
ports, "Case No. 97. J. Pierpont Morgan. Claim for payment
of ordnance stores Referred by special direction of the Sec-
retary of Wan . . . Claimed, $58,175." l *

In 1852 certain unserviceable ordnance stores were con-
demned by inspecting officers of the army, among them a batch
of HalFs carbines, which were thereafter sold from time to
time at prices ranging from Si to $2 apiece. Upon the outbreak
of war an adventurer, Arthur Eastman, negotiated for the pur-
chase of these carbines. After haggling over price and terms
the War Department issued instructions to sell Eastman 5,000
carbines at $3.50, "to be paid for at once," The prospective buyer,
having no money of his own, tried to buy the carbines 1,000
at a time payable in ninety days, and was refused. Eastman was
unable to raise the necessary money until a corrupt speculator,
Simon Stevens, agreed to make a loan of $20,000 in return
for a lien on the carbines (which Eastman had not purchased
and which were still government property) and an agreement
to sell them to Stevens at $12.50 apiece. All Eastman offered
in this transaction was a letter from the War Department
which magically produced a profit of $20,000. It was not
Stevens' money which Eastman received, but a draft issued
by J. Pierpont Morgan & Co. which was sold by Eastman to
Ketchum, Son &Co. who, according to Morris Ketchum's testi-
mony, expected "to get their money out of Mr. Morgan when

APPENDIX II 167

60 THE HOUSE OF MORGAN

he gets it." (Ketchum refused to tell the investigating com-
mittee what his profit was on the deal, that "being my private
business which the government has no right to inquire into.**) 11

Although desperately in need of arms the government was
not using any of the Hall carbines, condemned as unfit and
dangerous for military use. Simon Stevens offered the carbines
for sale in a telegram to General J. C. Fremont, saying "I have
5,000 carbines for sale," which was untrue, no purchase having
been made and the carbines being still government property
stored in a government arsenal. Fremont, needing arms badly
and "in business as gentle as a girl and confiding as a
woman/* 12 accepted Stevens' offer, the price being $22. The
day after the receipt of Fremont's telegraphic acceptance
Arthur Eastman bought the 5,000 carbines at $3.50 apiece from
the War Department, payment of $17,486 being made by }.
Pierpont Morgan. When the "sale" was made to General Fre-
mont "the arms were still the property of the government,"
reported the investigating committee, "the proposal being to

sell the government its own arms The government not only

sold, one day, for $17,486 arms which it had agreed the day
before to repurchase for $109,912, making a loss to the United
States on the transaction of $92,426, but virtually furnished the
money to pay itself the $17,486 which it received. 1 ' " Moreover,
the arms were more dangerous to the Union troops than to
the Confederates.

The conspirators shipped 2,500 carbines. Apparently appre-
hensive, they did not ship the other carbines until payment of
$55,550 for the first batch had been received by J. Pierpont
Morgan that is, forty days after the "sale," although General
Fremont had urged "hurry." Their apprehensions were justi-
fied. Payment for the second batch of carbines was refused
and Morgan's bill for $58,175 turned over to the Secretary of
War who referred it to the committee investigating govern-
ment contracts. After severely castigating the participants in
the transaction, the committee allowed $9,678 on Morgan's

1 68 APPENDIX II

AND CARBINES 61

claim plus brokerage of $1,330. The claim for payment, Morgan
insisted, was justified because his House had "made advances
in good faith to Mr. Stevens on the security of his agreement
with General Fremont'* This claim of "good faith" was dis-
missed by the committee since Morgan "declined to disclose
the terms" upon which the advances were made to Stevens.
The committee said:

"Nor is it an unfair inference, from the unwillingness evi-
denced by the House in question [f. Pierpont Morgan & Co.]
to state the terms on which their advances were made, that if
these terms were disclosed they might supply evidence ^that,
during the negotiations for funds, doubts as to the sufficiency
of the security had actually presented themselves, and that
the confidence claimed to have been felt by them was largely
mingled with distrust** "

The committee included in its decision a discourse to
Stevens, Morgan, Ketchum and Eastman on equity and good
citizenship:

"It is impossible to regard such a transaction as having been
entered upon in good faith, and as having, for such reason,
an equitable claim to be confirmed. In France, during periods
of civil commotion, may often be seen inscribed on the bridges,
monuments and other public structures the words 'committed
to the guardianship of (he citizens of France! In our country
it should not be regarded as a romantic stretch of political
morality to declare that all public interests ought to be re-
garded as under similar guardianship, more especially in time
of trial and need like the present He cannot be looked upon
as a good citizen, entitled to favorable consideration of his
claim, who seeks to augment the vast burdens, daily increas-
ing, that are to weigh on the future industry of the country,
by demands on the Treasury for which nothing entitled to the
name of an equivalent has been rendered," I5

The carbine scandal assumed considerable political im-
portance, being one of many frauds reported in General Fre-

APPENDIX II 169

62 THE HOUSE OF MORGAN

mont f s army. Although the frauds were many (General
Grant complained of bad muskets, unfit beef, poor hay and
extortionate prices) IC there was proof of incompetence in
Fremont's case and the investigating committee- proposed to
oust him-. But Fremont was an implacable enemy of slavery
and there was an immediate rally to his defense by men who
considered the proposed ouster a move against the anti-slavery
forces (and of men who despised Abraham Lincoln). Thad-
deus Stevens interpreted the issue in terms of Fremont's "hon-
esty, integrity and patriotism/* and said that while "Simon
Stevens* speculation may not be very pleasant to look at, it
was a legitimate business transaction." 17 The implacable old
man, wrapt in the struggle to crush the slavocracy by
any and all means, cynically brushed aside the issue of cor-
ruptionas he did in the post-war struggle against the South.
Nevertheless, General Fremont was ousted on charges of in-
competence*

The investigating committee's castigation was 1 wasted on
Simon Stevens.* While Morgan withdrew from the case, Ste-
vens persisted in his claim and it was granted in iS66 by the
Court of Claims on a strictly technical decision. The Court,
four against one, decided there was "no proof of fraud" and
accepted Stevens* contention that he was the legal owner of
the carbinea at the time of their sale to Fremont, in spite of
their being still government property and stored in a govern-
ment arsenal. "It was General Fremont's duty to buy those
arms/' declared the Court. "Should he leave his troops un-
armed and suffer rebellion to rush in unresisted?" Since Fre-
mont did buy the carbines, "the government must abide the
responsibility and pay." 1 * This decision assured payment of

* Simon Stevens was mixed up in the customs frauds in New York City.
He refused to answer an investigating committee's questions about his profits
on a "labor contract" he had secured, insisting that "the government has no
right to inquire into my private affairs." Under pressure, however, Stevens
revealerf having paid $20,000 for the contract, another $42,000 in bribes and
making a profit of $60.000. (Reports of Committees, House of Representatives,
3rd Sess., 67th Cong,, Court of Claims, 1S62-3, pp. S3, 123.)

APPENDIX H

WAR AND CARBINES 63

all the "dead-horse claims" against the government held by
a horde of fraudulent contractors. 1 * It was a decision, more-
over, in accord with the mood of cynical corruption which
flourished in the national government after the Civil War,
unscrupulous, pervasive and appalling.

APPENDIX II 171

462 THE HOUSE OF MORGAN

CHAPTER V

(i) Clark, I, pp. 37**8; (2) Hunt's Mag., April 1857* p. 506; (3) Hoggson, p,
129; Hunt's Mag., Nov. 1844* P 43 2 5 (4) Stevens, p. 736; (5) Hoggson, p. 140;
Hunt's Mag., Nov. 1844, p. 432; (6) Bank Reformer, Dec. i, 1841, p, 53; (7)
Senate, Documents (1843), Doc. No. 104; (8) Statistical Abstract, 1928, p. 447;
(9) Hunt's Mag., Jan. 1857, p. 71; Williams, pp. 13, 14; Dewey, pp. 46, 56; Hob-
son, p. in; (io) Dictionary of National Biography, p. 577; (n) Hunt, II, p.
430; (12) Hanaford, pp. 240, 242; (13) Phelps, pp. 9, 10; Burr, pp. 39, 47; Moody*
Masters of Capital, p. 4; (14) Hunt's Mag., Jan. 1842, p. 94; ibid., Sept. 1850,
p. 348; (15) Peabody, An Address, pp* 16, 18; (16) Hunt's Mag., April 1857,
pp. 8, 9; (17) Times, Dec. 4, 1869; (18) New Age, Dec. 1910, p. 503; (19)
Hunt's Mag., Nov. 18441 P* 432; (20) Dewey, p. 230; Americana, Sept. 1912, pp.
860-62; (21) Tooke, II, pp. 306, 307; (22) Williams, p. 14; (23) ibid., p. 13;
(24) Peabody Memorial, p. 17; (*5> Itayckinck, I, p. 598; (26) Ward, p. 104;
(27) Myers, II, pp. 24-5; (28) Senate Doc. No. 610 (1839-40), pp. 149-87; (2?)
Hungerford, p. 302; (30) Hunt's Mag., Oct. 1850, p. 487; (31) Croffutt, pp.
45-50; (32) Hanaford, p. 78; (33) Clark, I, p. 7; Hanaford, p. 79; (34) Clark,
II, p. 7; (35) Hunt's Mag., Nov. 18571 P- 583; (36) Curry, p. 7; Bankers' Mag.,
April 1858, p. 837; (37) Hovey, p. 26; (38) McClure's, Oct. 1901, p. 509; C39>
Hovcy, p. a8.

CHAPTER VI

(i) Times, Aug. 19, 1864; (2) Clews, p. 664; (3) Hovcy, p. 46; (4) House,
Reports ot Committees, 1861-62, I, p. 52; (5) Times, May 28, i86i;fT6) Chase,""
II, p. 507; (7) U. S. Treasury Report, 1862, p. 28; (8) House Reports (1861-2),
It P* 34; (9) Cong. Globe (1862-3), p, 117; (10) House Reports (1861-2), Ap-
pendix; (u) House Reports (1861-2), I, pp. 657-8; (12) Times, Aug. 21,
1865; (13) House Reports, Appendix, UCVII; (14) ibid., LXXVI; (15) ibid,, LXX;
(16) House Reports (1861-2), II, LXXVH; (17) Cong. Globe (1862), p. 1851; (18)
Court of Claims (1866), II, pp. 96-102; (19) Myers, HI, p. 175.

CHAPHER VII

(i) Times, July 8, zi, 1865; (2) Hovey, p. 24; (3) Cornwallis, p. 8; (4) White,
p. 175; Cornwallis, p. io; Oberholtzer, I, p. 213; (5) Hovcy, p. 33; (6) Times,
Aug. 21, 1865; (7) ibid, July 14, 17, 1863; (8) Hovcy, p. 31; (9) Times, Oct. 6*
1863; (10) ibid., Oct. u, 1863; (11) ibid., Oct. 21, 1863; (12) ibid., Feb. 28,
1863; (13) World, June 22, 1864; (14) Bolles, p. 153? (15) Post, Oct. t, 1862;
<i6) Hovcy, p. 48; (17) Herald, June 23, 1864; (18) Times, June 23, 1864; (19)
Cornwallis, pp. 10-11; (20) Times, Aug. 28, 1865; Sept. 2, 1865; (21) ibid,
Sept. 9, 1865; (22) ibid., Dec, 31, 1865; (23) Wall Street Journal, April i, 19135
(24) Bankers' Mag., Dec. 1864. p. 508; (25) Journal of Commerce, April t, 1913.

CHAPTER VOT

(i) Adams, Foreign Intervention, p. 13; ScMueter, p. io; (2) Tunes, Oct. 2$,
1866; ibid, Oct. 31, 1866; (3) ibid, Oct. 27, $*, 1866; (4) Hanaford, p. 65; (5)
Saturday Evening Post, July 12, 1930* P* 4$; (6) Commons, American Industrial
Society, IX, pp. 76-8; (7) iWd. p. *W (*) Cbrk, H, pp. & 37> V>1 MitcheH

APPENDIX III

MORGAN

THE MAGNIFICENT

<Ike jQf* of
J. PIERPONT MORGAN

(1837-1913)

"By
JOHN K. WINKLER

Author ofjo&n 0., A Portrait m Oth

NEW YORK - THE VANGUARD PRESS

APPENDIX III 173

MORGAN the MAGNIFICENT

In I860 Junius Morgan suggested that Duncan, Sher-
man & Co* take his son into partnership* The proposal
was curtly declined. Angered, the elder Morgan directed
Pierpont to take an office of his own; and made him
American factor for George Peabody & Co. Soon the
name of J. Pierpont Morgan appeared on a small suite
on the second floor of the drab building at SO Exchange
Place, opposite the entrance to the old Stock Exchange,

For the next year or two young Morgan dealt in
foreign exchange and purchased miscellaneous securities
for the account of Peabody & Co. His eyes and ears were
always open to opportunity, however, and he never
overlooked a chance to speculate a bit on his own hook*

At the opening of the Civil War he took a private
flyer that provoked the ugly charge that he had sold
rotten muskets to the Government a charge that was
to pursue him all his life. In May, 1861, one Simon
Stevens came to Morgan and told him that he and
Arthur M. Eastman, of Manchester, N* H.j had an
opportunity to turn a pretty penny in the purchase and
resale to the Government of J,000 carbines in the Army
arsenal in New York. Four years before, Army ordnance
officers had condemned the guns as unserviceable and
dangerous. Whether Morgan was told this never devel-
oped. However, he advanced part of the purchase
money, taking a lien on half the carbines as collateral
security.

Eastman and Stevens paid $3.50 each for the guns,
which they promptly resold at $22 apiece to General
Fremont, commanding the Federal forces at St. Louis.
Tests showed that the carbines were obsolete* Fremont

174 APPM>IX HI

TRICKS OF A T R A P E

refused to authorize payment of the $109,912 agreed
upon. A War Department commission investigated and
awarded Eastman and Stevens $55, $50. Stevens de-
manded the full amount and sued in the Federal Court
of Claims for $58,000 additional. He won the case, the
Court holding that Fremont had entered into a contract
and "a contract is a contract*" The Court stated that
"by arrangement between Stevens and one J. Pierpont
Morgan, the voucher for the first 2,500 carbines de-
livered was to be made out in the name of Morgan,
which was done.**

Gustave Myers, author of "History of Great Ameri-
can Fortunes,** points out: "This decision opened the
way for the owners of what were then cynically called
'Deadhorse* claims to get paid* and also for those con-
tractors who had furnished other worthless arms and
supplies of shoddy clothing, rotten tents and blankets,
pasteboard shoes, adulterated food and other goods to
the Government at exorbitant prices. A fine beginning
for the great J. Pierpont Morgan, was it not?**

So far as the writer is aware, Morgan never answered
oft-repeated allegations that he had knowingly profited
through this legal but tricky transaction.

The dour young broker created his first real ripple
in Wall Street when Charleston, South Carolina, was
tinder bombardment and its fall expected momentarily.
Gold was at a premium. Importers in New York were
delaying remittances abroad, hoping to take advantage
of a falling market* But Charleston did not surrender,
and gold continued to rise both on the Exchange and in
that curious institution at William Street and Exchange

APPENDIX IV 175

THE

Robber Barons

THE GREAT AMERICAN CAPITALISTS
1861-1901

fry Matthew Josephsoa

There we never wanting some persons
of violent and widertaldng natures,
o> so they may have power and
business* will take it of my cost.

FRANCIS BACOH

HARCOURT, BRACE AND COMPANY

NEW YORK

1 76 APPENDIX IV

OF EMPIRE-BUILDERS 59

After his apprentice years Pierpont Morgan in New York en-
joyed, through his father's intervention, the American agency for
the banking house of George Peabody & Co. Junius Morgan, like
the somewhat older and better loved George Peabody, was a man
of the highest business probity. This meant that he was "conserva-
tive," that in the pursuit of the most soundly profitable chances
for gain he discharged his trust faithfully to those who entered into
collusion with him. It meant being highly scrupulous, almost puri-

APPENDIX IV 177

60 THE ROBBER BARONS

tanical in fulfilling the letter of all contracts, so that the "good-wilT
of depositors and clients might be retained over a long period of
years. For such qualities of conservatism and purity George Pea-
body & Co., the old tree out of which the House of Morgan grew,
.was famous. In the panic of 1857, when depreciated securities had
been .thrown on the market by distressed investors in America, Pea-
body and the elder Morgan, being in possession of cash, had pur-
chased such bonds as possessed real value freely, and then resold
them at a large advance when sanity was restored In this way they
had won the plaudits of such a statesman as Edward Everett, "for
having performed the miracle by which an honest man turns paper
into gold."

For the same "conservative" reasons, Peabody and Morgan, as
international bankers, busied themselves during the Civil War in
conducting the flight of American capital which brought great sums
of money to be placed with them in London. In the Springfield Re-
publican, Samuel Bowles attacked them saying:

, . . They gave its no faith 'and no help hi- our struggle for na**
tional existence. . . No individuals contributed so much to flood-
ing the money markets 'with evidences of our debts to Europe, and
breaking down their prices and 'weakening financial confidence In
our nationality y and none made more money by the operation.

But such strange charges were based of course on an innocent mis-
conception of the clear interest of the bankers, which confused their
role with that of those common men who served because they
loved to serve, as Judge Thomas Mellon would say, at Gettysburg
or The Wilderness. The saner and more widely accepted view was
of course that expressed by Samnel Tildcn at a public banquet to
Junius Morgan, some years after the war, in which the father of
Pierpont Morgan was lauded for "upholding unsullied the honor of
America in the tabernacles of the old world* . * . While you are
scheming for your own selfish ends, there is an overruling and wise
Providence directing that most of aU you do should inure to the
benefit of the people."

While full of probity like his father, Pierpont Morgan already
under his silent, phlegmatic exterior nourished more impetuous am*
birions to advance the common goodJEarly irT 1861, when many
pressed to fill war contracts, a wise Providence doubtless- directed

APPENDIX IV

OF EMPIRE-BUILDERS 6l

film upon a venture in war munitions, on the sensiblg ground that
carbines were as keenly demanded as bags of coffee several years
before,

A certain Simon Stevens, who had an option for 5,000 Hall car-
bines, through another dealer named Eastman, came to Morgan with
an urgent request for a loan against this war material which he soon
hoped to sell to the government at a profit. In advance, he had by
telegraph arranged to sell them to General Fremont, who headed the
Western Army quartered near St. Louis. Stevens, who had long been
engaged in obscure transactions with customhouse officials, may
or may not have divulged that he needed the sum of $17,486 from
Morgan in order to purchase the carbines from the very same gov-
ernment at Washington whose army in the West clamored for guns.
This paradoxical situation was caused by the fact that the carbines
in question were found by inspection to be so defective that they
would shoot off the thumbs of the soldiers using them. The quar-
termaster at Washington sold them for $3.50 apiece. "The govern-
ment had sold one day for $17,486 arms which it had agreed the
day before to purchase for 8109,912," as a Congressional committee
later discovered. That young Morgan knew of this situation is plain
from the fact that after arrival of the consignment of guns at General
Fremont's di\*ision, he bluntly presented his claim not for the money
he had advanced, but for all of $58,175, Half of the shipment having
been already paid for in good faith.

Morgan's claim for the full sum of $109,912, where he had loaned
only $i 7,485, may have been an indication to the Congress that his
part in the affair was something more than a passive money-lender's,
In the ensuing investigation, March 3, 1863, a Committee on Gov-
ernment Contracts, amid much outcry on "pillage, fraud, extortion*'
had demanded that Morgan disclose the terms upon which he had
entered the transaction, though without breaking his obdurate si-
lence. The Congressmen had not been convinced that this large and
sullen young man's operations "inured to the benefit of the people,"
and had seen fit to lecture him. Of him and his fellows their report
had said:

H- e cannot be looked upon as a good citizen, entitled to favorable
consideration of his clam, who seeks to augment the vast burdens*
dally increasing that are to weigjj on the future industry of the

APPENDIX IV

179

6l THE ROBBER BARONS

country, by demands upon the treasury for 'which nothing entitled
to the name of an equivalent has been rendered. . . . Worse than
traitors in arms are the men 'who pretending loyalty to the flag, feast
and fatten on the misfortunes of the nation, while patriot blood is
crimsoning the plains of the South and bodies of their countrymen
are moldering in the dust?

i8o

APPENDIX V

MERCHANTS
DEATH

A Study of the International
Armament Industry

BY

. a ENGELBRECHT, PH. D.

Associate Editor, The World Tomorrow

AND

R C HANIGHEN

FOREWORD BY

HARRY ELMER BARNES

ILLUSTBATEb

DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
NEW YORK 1934

APPENDIX V 181

SECOND-HAND DEATH 59

twentieth of an inch thick, and the stocks were made of
green wood which shrank so that bands and trimmings be-
came loose* The bayonets were often of such frail composi-
tion that they bent like lead and many of them broke off
during bayonet drill. Some of the rifle barrels were rough
inside from imperfect boring and burst during target prac-
tice, 3

So flagrant and widespread were these abuses that there
was much talk about the necessity of government arsenals
to insure good arms. One expert estimated that the arms,
ordnance and munitions of war bought by the government
from private contractors and foreign armories since the be-
ginning of the war cost, over and above the positive ex-
penses of their manufacture, ten times as much as would
establish and put into operation the arsenals and foundries
which the government could build itself. Muskets which
the contractors sold, on the average, for about $22 apiece
could have been made in national workshops for one-half
that price*

One of the Congressional investigators, Representative
Wallace, summarized his findings: "When we look at the
manner in which our army and government have been de-
frauded by peculators, we must shrink from the idea of trust-
ing to private contractors to furnish the necessary means
for our national defense. Dependence upon private con-
tractors for arms and munitions of war is too precarious
and uncertain in all respects, as well as too costly, upon
which to rest such an important and vital interest of the
nation. n 4

Among the profiteering arms merchants of the Civil War
was John Pierpont Morgan. Morgan was in his middle
twenties when the war broke out, but he did not enlist or

1 82 APPENDIX V

60 MERCHANTS OF DEATH

shoulder a gun during the entire conflict. He had heard of
the great lack of guns in the army and he decided to do his
share in bringing relief* 5

A few years previously the army had condemned as
obsolete and dangerous some guns then in use, known as
Hall's carbines. These guns were ordered sold at auction
and they were disposed of at prices ranging between $1
and $2, probably as curios. In 1861 there still remained
5,000 of these condemned guns. Suddenly on May 28, 1861,
one Arthur M. Eastman appeared and offered $3 apiece for
them. This high price should have made the officials sus-
picious, but apparently it did not. Back of Eastman was
a certain Simon Stevens who was furnishing the cash for
the transaction, but the real backer of the enterprise was
J, P. Morgan,

After the condemned guns had been contracted for, Ste*
vens sent a wire to General Fremont at St. Louis informing
him that he had 5,000 new carbines in perfect condition.
Did Fremont want them? Immediately an order (amount*
ing to a contract) arrived from Fremont urging that the
guns be sent at once. The guns were bought from the gov-
ernment and Morgan paid $3*50 a piece for them, a total
of $17,486, These condemned carbines were now moved out
of the government arsenal and sent to Fremont, and the
bill presented was $22 a piecethat is, $109,912, a profit
of $92,426.

When Fremont's soldiers*tried to fire these "new carbines
in perfect condition," they shot off their own thumbs. Great
indignation was roused by this transaction when it became
known, and the government refused to pay Morgan's bill,
Morgan promptly sued the government and his claim was
referred to a special commission which was examining dis*

APPENDIX V 183

SECOND-HAND DEATH 61

puted claims and settling them*

This commission curiously enough, did not reject the
Morgan claim entirely and denounce him for his unscrupu-
lous dealings. It allowed half of the claim and proposed to
pay $13.31 a carbine, that is, $66,550.00 for the lot This
would have netted Morgan a profit of $49,000. But Morgan
was not satisfied* He had a "contract" from Fremont and
he was determined to collect in full.

Accordingly he sued in Stevens' name in the Court of
Claims and the court promptly awarded him the full sum,
because "a contract is sacred," a decision that was the open-
ing wedge for hundreds of other "deadhorse claims" which
Congress had tried to block. Of this affair Marcellus Hart*
ley, who himself had brought over from Europe huge quan-
tities of discarded arms and had sold them to the govern-
ment at exorbitant prices, declared: "I think the worst thing
this government has been swindled upon has been those con-
founded Hall's carbines; they have been elevated in price
toJ22,50, I think."

^fhese curious dealings, however, must not obscure the
importance of the second-hand gun in the Civil War. An-
other indication of the extent of this traffic in a later period
may be found in a notation from the Army and Navy Jour-
nal which records that, for the year 1906, $1,000,000 was
paid into the United States Treasury from the sale of ob-
solete and condemned government stores.

The largest of these used-arms dealers is probably Fran-
cis Bannerman & Sons of New York City. This extraor-
dinary company got its start in 1865 after the Civil War,
when it bought at auction sales large quantities of military
goods. Its New York office at 501 Broadway is the finest
military museum in New York City. Up the Hudson near

184 APPENDIX VI

IRON,
BLOOD

and PROFITS

An Exposure of the

WORLD-WIDE
MUNITIONS RACKET

By

GEORGE SELDES

Author of

"YOU CAN'T PRINT THAT!"
"THE VATICAN: YESTERDAY-
TOD AY-TOMORROW/' Etc.

HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON MCMXXXIV

APPENDIX VI 185

THE PROFITS IN WAR-MAKING (AMERICAN) 227

it is prepared to make the poison gases and chemicals of the
nexjjwar.

Among the greatest financial houses founded on profits in the
Civil War is that of Morgan.

In 1857 American army inspectors condemned as obsolete and
dangerous a quantity of HalPs carbines, which the government
then auctioned off at between one and two dollars each. In 1861
there were still some 5,000 of these rifles awaiting sale in the
New York arsenal. A certain Mr. Arthur Eastman, of Man-
chester, New Hampshire, offered $3 each for the lot, but the
authorities asked more and finally compromised on $3.50. East-
man, however, could not find the cash, but eventually obtained
it from Simon Stevens. There are legal records showing that the
man who supplied the money to Stevens was the original J. P.
Morgan.

General Fremont, in St. Louis, was overjoyed when on August
5, 1861, he received a telegram from Stevens offering him 5,000
new carbines, in perfect condition. It meant everything to Fre-
mont's command. He gave the order to purchase. J. P. Morgan
thereupon paid over exactly $17,486 to the New York authorities
and shipped the guns to the Missouri authorities. The shipment
went from arsenal to arsenal. General Fremont paid $22 each for
the condemned guns.

In 1862 a Congressional committee investigated the scandal
which had made a small fortune for the twenty-four-year-old
banker, J. P. Morgan. It was found that bribery was prevalent
among officers in the Union Army. Major McKinstry, quarter-
master at Fremont's headquarters, was court-martialed on sixty-
one charges and fired out of the army. The Morgan incident in
the Congressional committee report, which Gustavus Myers
quotes in his History of the Great American Fortunes is summed
up as follows:

"Thus the proposal actually was to sell to the government at
$22 each, 5,000 of its own arms, the intention being, if the offer
was accepted, to obtain these arms from the government at
$3.50 each. ... It is very evident that the very funds with which
this purchase was effected were borrowed on the faith of the pre-
vious agreement to selL The government not only sold one day

l86 APPENDIX VI

228 IRON, BLOOD AND PROFITS

for $17,486 arms which it had agreed the day before to repur-
chase for $109,912 making a loss to the United States o!
$9,426 but virtually furnishing the money to pay itself the
$17,486 which it received."

The condemned rifles were so bad they shot off at least the
thumbs of Union soldiers trying to use them. The government
refused to pay. But Morgan pressed his claim. There is on record
the suit, J. Pierpont Morgan vs. the United States Government,
Case No. 97. The government off ered to settle at $13.81 each for
the useless carbines and paid out $55,550, which Morgan took
"on account'* and entered another suit in the Court of Claims for
$58,000 more. The honourable court ruled that General Fremont
had made a contract, which contract bound the American govern*
ment, and the fact that Morgan represented old, dangerous rifles
as new could not enter the case, nor could the fact that the money
paid for the guns in New York was really the government's
money. A contract is a contract, as every student learns the first
day he studies law. The court awarded Morgan and his associates
the full amount of the claim. This episode, according to Myers,
is the actual beginning of the Morgan business career.

INDEX

187

Adult Bible Class Magazine: 105
Andrews, Theodore F.: 128 n 77
Appendages, carbine: 30-32
Argonaut: 108
Army Regulations, Revised, of

1861: 62
Ashton, J. Hubley: 53, 131-134

n 114

Associated Press: 115
Austrian muskets: 55, 93, 135

n 119, 147 n 159

Babcock, H. H.: n

Barnes, Harry Elmer: in

Barney, Hiram: 81

Beecher, Henry Ward: 28

Bibliography: 149-153

Elaine, James G. : 70

Blair family: 25

Blake, Wm.: 116

Bomford, Col. George: 58-59

Book-of-the-Month Club: 97, 98

Budenz, Louis F. : 106

Buffington, Lt. H. R.: 136 n 120,

138 n 126
Bull Run: 3, 9, n, 15, 38, 78, 145

n 14.2
Burnside's carbines: 55, 63, 144

n 140

"Cadwallader": 88

Callender, Cap't F. D.: 26, 27, 30,

32-36, 88
Cameron, Simon, Sec'y of War:

7, 10, 15, *6, 34, 35, 36, 38, 45,

72, 80, 122 n 13, 146 n 14&
Canadian Bankers Association,

Journal of: 109
Cantwell, Robert: 104
Capital Times: 116
Casey, Judge: 131 n 112
Chamberlain, John: 82, 93
Chubb, Mrs.: 66
Cisco, John J. : 46
Clark, Sen. Daniel: 6, 8
Cochran (gun) : 138 n 127
Cochran, Thos. C,: 117
Collins, Frederick L.: 116
Colt, Colonel : 122 n 18
Columbia Encyclopaedia: 113
Commission on Ordnance Claims

and Contracts: see Ordnance

Commission

"Condemnation" of Hall carbines:
see Hall carbines, "condemna-
tion" of

Congressional Investigating Com-
mittee: see House Investigation

Corey, Lewis: 93-95; substitutes
Morgan's name for Ketchum's
94; 96, 97, 103, 115; name as-
sumed by Louis C. Fraina, 94-
95

Court of Claims, decision in: see
Stevens v. U. S.

Craig, Col. H, K.: 60-62, 63, 139-
140 n 136

Crichton, Kyle: see "Forsythe,
Robert"

Cummings, Alexander: 129 n 79

Customs House contract: 66-67,
88, 93-94, XXX-IX2

Daily News: 107-108

Daily Worker (also Sunday Work-
er) : 106-107, 116

Dawes, Rep. Henry L.: 37, 130
n 89

Dos Passos, John: 113

Duffus, R. L.: 103-104

"Dead-horse claims": 54, 87, xox,

102

Debates, in Congress, on Hall
carbine affair: in Senate 43; In
House 43-44, 48, 79, 129-130 nn
79, 84, 89

Destler, Chester Me A.: 117

Dictionary of American Biogra~
phy: 113-114

Dispatch, Sunday: 128 n 77

Eastman, Arthur M.: buys car-
bines 6-10 ; sells carbines 11-18,
125 n 51; strained relations
with Stevens 20, 68; relations
with Ketchum. 21; refuses pay-
ment for appendages but col-
lects for them 30-32; testifies
35, 47, 65; attitude of House In-
vestigation toward, 39-40; ig-
nored by press 43; 5* 7 77-79?
role misrepresented by Myers
84; by Corey 93-94; by Winkler
96, 104, 109, 123 n 25
Engelbrecht, H. C.: 98-101, 105
Evening Star (Washington) : 43

i88

INDEX

Fenton, Rep. Beuben 12. : 37

Floyd, John B., Sec'y of War:
61-62, 139-144. n 136

Flynn, John T. : 115-116

"Forsythe, Robert": 107

Fralna, Louis C. : 94-95; 147 n
160; see also Corey, Lewis

Frankford Arsenal: 9, 125 n 51

Fremont, Gen. John C.: buys car-
bines 13^17; joined by Stevens
in St. Louis 19; receives first
half of arms and pays therefor
22, 26-29; criticisms of, 25;
Voucher maze and, 33-36; 37;
House Investigation and, 38-4.2;
press comment 42-43 ; Joint
Committee and, 43; Ordnance
Commission and, 47-50; sus-
tained by Court, 51-54; attitude
toward carbines, 13, 55, 60, 123-
124 n 27; defended by friends
43, 62; relations with Stevens 66,
69; 72-73, 78-80, his testimony
ignored by Myers 85, 86, 88-89;
misrepresented by Winkler 96-
97; IQI, 104, in

Fuller, Claud B.: 64, 134 n 116,
137 n 121

Gitlow, Benjamin: 147 n 160
Goodwin, James G: 33
Governor's Island Arsenal: 7, 9,

15, 16, 30-32, 63, 101, 102, 112
Granger, Cap't: 135 n 119, 136

n 120, 145 n 142, r47 n 159
Grant, Ulysses S.: 135 n 119
Gras, N. S. B.: 114
Greeley, Horace: 70
Griel, Jacob : 23, 24, 146 n 149

Hag^ner, Major P. V,: 4-5, 14-15,

*9 s$7 35-36, 37 39, 40, 45, 57, 63,
122 n 18* 138 n 125, 145 ti 142

Hall, Cap't John H.: 56-59, 137 n
121, 138 n 124

Hall carbine affair: debates in
Congress about, 43-44, 48, 79,
129-130 nn 79, 99, 84, 89; Myers's
version 82-92, 99; Corey's ver-
sion 93-95; Winkler's version
96-97; Josephson's version 97-
98; version of Engelforecht &
Hanighen 98-101; Seldes's ver-
sion 98-102; miscellaneous ac-
counts 1 03 - n 7

Hall carbines: Appendages for,
30-32

Alleged propensity of, for thumb
shooting: 57-58, 64, 85, 97, 101,
ni
"condemnation" of: 60-64, 77> 85,

HI, 139-144 n 136
condition of: 55, 134-137 nn. 116-

120

Congressional resolution con-
cerning: 40, 43, 48
expert opinions concerning: :
Fremont's 144 ^ 141; House
committee's 40 ; Ordnance
Commission's 47-49; Court of
Claim's 53 ; Hagner's 63 ;
Granger's 145 n 142; Fuller's
64, 137 n 121

Myers's ignorance of: 84, 85-86
purchase by Cummings of

790: 129 7i 79

purchases by Ordnance Bu-
reau: 62, 63, r45 n 14^
sale by Eastman to Stevens
11-18; by Ripley to Eastman
6-ro, 125 n 51; by Stevens to
Fremont 13-17
sale of, without auction: 62, 139

n 1S6

Hall patents, history of: 56 et seq.
Hanighen, F. C.: 98-102
Harper's Ferry Arsenal: 64
Harrington, George: 34
Hartley, Marcellus: 89-90, 101
Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 71
Herald, New York: 43
Hoey, John: 2,6
Holman, Rep. William S. : 37, 44,

129 n $4

Holt, Joseph: 45, 46, 47
Holt, Kush: no

House Investigation: 7, 35-44, 48,
51, 65, 69, 79, 80, 83, 85-86, 88,
115, 127 n 77, 129 7i 79
Howard, John Raymond: 28
Howard, John T. : 25-30, 33, 39
Howe, Quincy: 104
Hubbard, Major E. S.: n, 18,

2O-2I, 23, 65

Independent: 116

Jackson, Governor: 15
Jackson, Rep. James S. : 37
Jenks patent arms: 59

INDEX

189

Joint Committee on the Conduct

of the War: 43, 60, 79, 84
Josephson, Matthew: 97-98, 105
Journal, New Ulm, Minn.: 106

Ketchum, Morris: loan to Stevens
21 ; partial repayment 22; and
Hubbard 23; terms of loan to
Stevens 23-24; 27, 32, handles
Voucher No. 2, 34; testifies 23-
24, 36, 40; before Ordnance
Commission 46-50; before
Court of Claims 51; relations
with Stevens, Morgan, Op-
dyke 65, 68-69; 72, 79; cited by
Corey 93; name changed by
Corey 94; 107

Ketchum, Son & Co.: 49, 94, 130
n 101

Knott, Judge: 131 n 112

Larson, Henrietta M.: 114, 117
Leader (Milwaukee) : 105
Lewinsohn, Richard: 112, 148 n

167

Limpus, Lowell: 107
Lincoln, Abraham: 3, 4, 25, 66, 68,

72, 108

Long, Huey: 109-110
Loring, Judge: 131 n 112
Lovett, Robert Morse: 104
Lyon, General: 25

Mariposa mine: 14, 28, 69
Marston, William: 20, 69, 135

nn 117 > 118

Maynard's carbine: 136 n 120
McKinstry, Major: 88, 101
"Meyer", Gustavus: 115-116
Missouri Democrat: 43
Morgan, J. P. & Co.: 18
Morgan, J. Pierpont: makes loan
to Stevens 15-18; strained rela-
tions with Stevens 20, 78; loan
repaid 21-23; Vouchers drawn
in favor of, 26, 27, 30, 33-34 J at-
titude of House Investigation
toward, 39, 42; role ignored by
public 43; minimized in House
debate 44; claim filed in Mor-
gan's name 46, 47; does not tes-
tify in suit 51; virtually ignored
by Court 52; relations with
Stevens family 65, 67-69; 72-73,
78-81; part in Hall carbine af-

fair told by Myers 82-92; by
Corey 93-95 J by Winkler 96-97;
by Josephson 97-98; by Engel-
brecht & Hanighen and Seldes
98-102; by miscellaneous writers

M J?3-7; 8-9

"Morgan, J. Pierpont & Co.": 94

"Morgan, J. Pierpont v. IL S.",
alleged suit: 84-85, 101

Morgan, Junius Spencer: 67, 81

Mulligan, Colonel: 25

Myers, "Gustave": 97

Myers, Gustavus: 82-92; 93, 96,
97, 98-102, 103, no, 112, 113, 115-
116, 118

National Republican: 43

Nevins, Allan: 91, 104, 114-115

New Leader: 116

New Republic: 104

North's improvement: 55, 59,

123-124 n 27

North, Simeon: 58, 77, 138 n 124
Notes: 121-148

Opdyke, George: 21, 68-69, Si,

146-147 n 149
Opdyke v. Weed, 69
Ordnance Commission: 7, 36, 42,

45-50, 79-80, 83-86, 89, 98, 115, 127

n 77, 135 n 118
Owen, Robert Dale: 45, 47, no,

127 n 77, 130 n 89

Pargellis, Stanley: 117
Peabody, George: 67, 81
Peck, Judge: 52, 131 n 112
Perry, Commodore M. C.: 60
PM: 109, u 6
Pope, General: 136 n 120
Post, New York: 112, n6
Pringle, Henry F.: 82

Random House, Inc.: 82, 90

Rascoe, Burton: 104

Record, Philadelphia: 107

Redman, Ben Ray: 82, 90

Ripley, Brig. Gen. James W.: sells
carbines 6-10; demands pay-
ment for appendages 31; dis-
covers Fremont's purchase 35,
37; House Investigation find-
ings 38-39; testifies 42, 62; dis-
cussed in press and Congress
43-44; 51, 55; letter to Ordnance
Commission 60; opinion of Hall

43-.
Coi

I9O

INDEX

arms 62-63; 7^, 77; Myers ig-
nores Ripley documents 84;
Myers accepts Kipley testimony
85; 122 nn 3, IS, 18; testimony
on purchase of 790 Hall car-
bines 129 n 79; 139-144 n 136

Roberts, Gordon: 115

Rochester, Anna : 106

Russell, Bertrand: no

Sandburg-, Carl: 113, 115, 129 n 79
Satterlee, Herbert L. : 91, 114, 115
Saturday Review of Literature:

104

Schoneld, J. M. : 53, 131-134 n 114-
Scott, William Forse: 137 n 1%O
Seldes, George: 98-102, 117
Sentinel, Pickens, S. Car.: 108
Shanks, Rep.: 136 n 120
Sharps' carbines: 55, 63, 136 n

12,0, 144 71 14O

Sinclair, Upton: 112

Smith's carbines: 63, 144 n 14O

Springfield Arsenal : 10

St. Louis Arsenal: 26, 99-102

Stanton, Edwin M., Sec'y of War:

45, 46-47, 53

Steele, Rep. William G.: 37
Stevens, Benjamin Franklin: 67,

70, 71
Stevens, Henry, sr. : 66, 70, Si, 145-

146 n 147

Stevens, Henry, jr.: 17, 67, 81
Stevens, Simon: buys and sells
carbines 11-18, 125 n 51; aide-
de-camp to Fremont 19; finan-
cial difficulties 19-21; borrows
from Ketch um 21; relations
with Hubbard 18, 20, 23; terms
of loans 22-24; relations "with
Howard 25-29; and carbine ap-
pendages 30-32; agent or princi-
pal 33, 39-41; in Washing-ton 34;
Hagner testifies concerning 35-
36; and Voucher maze 127 tt 77;
testifies 35; House Investigation
39-42; comment in press and
Congress about 42-44; and Ord-
nance Commission, 46-50; sues
U. S. 51-54; 56, 63; biography
and connections with Morgan
family 65-70; character of, 69,
70-71, 146 n 147; Customs House
contract 66-67, 88, 93-94, xxi-
1x2; 73; 78-81; attitude of

Myers toward, 84-85; of Corey
93-94; of Winkler 97; of En-

felbreeht <fe Hanighen and Sel-
es 98-102; of other "writers 109,
in; relations "with Eastman
123 n 25; with Thaddeus Stev-
ens 145-146 n 147

Stevens, Sophia C. : 67, 71, 81

Stevens, Thaddeus: 43, 66, 69, 81,
145-146 n 147, 146-147 n 149

Stevens v. U. S.: 51-54, 63, 79, 83,
84, 86-87, 93, 97, 101-102, 131-134
-n 114

Syms, William J. : 89

Talcott, Lt. Col. G.: 59
Taunton Locomotive Works: 20
Thomas, L., Adjutant General: 36
Thompson, Ralph: 82, 116
Thumbs, shooting off: see Hall

carbines, alleged propensity of,

for thumb shooting
Times, New York: 54, 87, 91, 92,

103, 116, 127-128 n 77
Tribune, Chicago: 43
Tribune, New York: 43, 127-128

n f 77) 130 n 89

Turnley, Cap't Parmenas T.: 26
Trumbull, Senator: 129 n 79

Union Defense Committees: 4, 5

Van Wyck, Rep. Charles H. : 37, 42
Voucher No. i : 27, 30, 33-36, 39,

52, 126 n 65, 127 n 77, 131 n 109
Voucher No. 2: 30-32, 33-36, 39, 50,

51, 126 n 65, 127 n 77, 131 n 109

Wallace, Edith Harriet: caption

under frontispiece; 70-71
War Department Commission : see

Ordnance Commission
Washburne, Rep. Elihu B. : 37
Watson, Francis: 112
Weed, Thurlow: 68
Wells, H, G.: no
Whiteley, Cap't R. H. K.: 7, 9, 16,

30-32, 135 n 118
Whitney, Eli: 138 n 124
Winkler, John K. : 96-97, 103, 104,

no

Wood, Fernando: 3
Woods, Col. I. C. ("Ike") : 136-

137 n 120

ftthitr

(Etig

Presented to the Library by

The Author
Gordon R. Wasson

126683

00 <

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